Against the Idol of the Sun: A 5e high-level campaign log

[RandoMan]

Really enjoy reading this campaign log. Feel like I'm back reading Kaveman campaign logs!

The Panoply of the Shark/item set idea and all your puzzles have been fun. I really like the fleshcrafter stuff too. Thank you for putting all the work into this hexcrawl. I know how much work prepping exploration description results can be. They're short individually but a lot collectively!

[J-H]

Really enjoy reading this campaign log. Feel like I'm back reading Kaveman campaign logs!

The Panoply of the Shark/item set idea and all your puzzles have been fun. I really like the fleshcrafter stuff too. Thank you for putting all the work into this hexcrawl. I know how much work prepping exploration description results can be. They're short individually but a lot collectively!

Wow, that's a high complement! Kaveman26, SilverClawShift, and Sagiro's Story Hour are the gold standard for modern campaign logs. Thank you.

Session 39, 3/4/2023
The battle continues! We swap Ratel in for where Rivkah was in the map left over from last time and resume play. I think the fight lasted 3-4 rounds before I called it.
Teador, blinded from the Prismatic Wall, spent what I think was his first round casting Destructive Wave, a 5th level Paladin spell that I’ve always overlooked. It’s not really that much more damage than Fireball, but it’s in a 30’ radius, so it covers over double the area that Fireball does, and with a more favorable damage type, and knocks enemies prone on a failed save – of which there were a lot. He cleared out 4 or 5 small golems completely and knocked an Iron Golem and a few enemies flat with it.
Saqwam, changed into a Planetar, went to town with the big sword that does 4d6+7+5d8-ish damage twice a round. He also used the healing ability to clear Teador’s blindness after a round or two. Once he was not blinded, Teador critted an iron golem, then added a 4th level smite, and did 142-ish damage with that one hit. The followup knocked the last 20hp off.
Ratel killed an enemy priest, then helped go after the high priest. He got counter-struck with the Rainbow Morningstar and had to suffer through 3 rounds of being Restrained by the petrification effect – although that didn’t stop him from landing some stunning fists.

There were a couple of more Prismatic Sprays. It’s fun, but all the dice-rolling can be annoying the fourth time the spell is cast. It may be worth making a spreadsheet similar to the one I use for Perception checks… pre-roll a bunch of lines of Prismatic Spray with what D8 is rolled (just going around the table) and what the damage type and amount is for it.

The enemy high priest got knocked to sub-30 hit points once or twice more before dying. Reinforcements arrived 3 rounds in a row. First, a senior priest (who cast Heal on the HP) and a couple of acolytes, then the Quetzal from the rooftop after the High Priest used Power Word Stun on Teador, then a few golems came up from the 1st floor.
The Quetzal’s abilities were mostly saved against, and the one full attack routine it got was just a bunch of misses due to bad dice-rolls. Then it got stunlocked and died.
Troudar was the target of a lot of abilities and passed almost all his saves (Indomitable and paladin aura). He did get to block a Guiding Bolt with his crystal sword, but after most of the casters were down, switched back to the Maul of Extreme Pain for the extra damage.

It was getting late, and there was no doubt that the party, with everyone >80hp, could deal with the last couple of golems. It became “Ok, do you loot the room and leave, or do you explore the rest of the temple?”

DM note: There were enemy soldiers outside, but the party made a mostly unobserved approach to the temple, there’s a fire, and most of their leadership is either busy with the fire or in the temple getting slaughtered. I decided that the quetzals would probably end up organizing an ambush outside for when the party left, or would send in a huge mass of soldiers if the party was still there after 10 minutes.

I kept rough track of time as the party sped through the top floor of the temple, wrecking the heart & blood storage room, ignoring the room that stores ritual vestments, and saying “Not going to stop” for a room full of enchanting components and reagents – 15,000gp worth, but it’d take 5 minutes to properly loot the room into their bags of holding. They then find a meditation room, a scrying room (crystal ball stolen, and a “That’s how they were spying on us!” discussion), and a library of inventor’s notes on failed and successful inventions, enchantments, etc. Ratel decides to steal about 20% of the room there, shoving shelves of papers into their bags…. Then they light the room on fire.

Heading downstairs, they stick to the middle of the building and go through a testing area (measuring apparatus, targets, and a damage ward that didn’t get triggered), opening doors as they explore. The next room was golem storage (1 iron, 1 clay, 1 stone, 1 mind golem). Nobody including me had any doubt they could handle the fight pretty quickly, so I just put down a tick mark for a half minute or so. Golem storage then lead to a room at the center of the temple with no other doors in. They figure out that was probably where they wanted to be, and the high priest had had a key. They were right! It was the treasury.

After looting it, they activate the Helm of Teleportation, using a rock from their hideout as a focus, and teleport straight out, completely skipping the blocking force outside.

We go over loot, and the choices of epic boons. I have presented each of them with a short list of ~4 boons to pick from based on what their characters have done or focused on, plus a species-based option. They’ll pick.

Loot from the Treasury:
50,000gp
+3 halberd
Necklace of Adaptation
Wings of Flying cloak
Manual of Golems (Iron). If someone had a way to accelerate the passage of time, they could afford to build an Iron Golem…

Loot from the High Priest:
Breastplate +2
Shield +1
Polychromatic Mantle: Legendary cloak that gives resistance to all the damage types Prismatic Spray deals, as well as advantage on saves vs. Blindness and Petrification
Rainbow Morningstar: Legendary +3 morningstar, 8 charges, regain 1d6 charges per day. On hit, once per round, discharge a charge to deal an effect to a target as though the target had failed a dexterity save against Prismatic Spray.

Teador is probably taking the cloak, and Troudar is probably taking the Morningstar.

DM Note: The endgame draws closer! It’s fun to hand out epic options.
Also, they really like to light things on fire.

Here are the epic boon options I gave them to pick from for the first round of Epic Boons.

Spoiler

Show

Ratel, wood elf kensei monk
-Peerless Aim: Get +20 to a ranged attack roll 1/short rest
-Deep Impact (mine): Martial arts damage die now d20 for unarmed strikes only.
-Elf: Hearing the Air. An elf gains blindsight 30’ unless in an area of magical silence, and has advantage on Perception checks.
-Undetectability (DMG): +10 to Stealth, immunity to scrying & divination

Teador, half elf paladin
-Truesight: Truesight 60'
-Recovery: As a BA 1/LR, recover 1/2 max HP
-Half elf: Choose one between:
• Elf Hearing the Air. An elf gains blindsight 30’ unless in an area of magical silence, and has advantage on Perception checks.
• Human Versatile Adaptation. A human +1 on all skill and ability checks.
-Undetectability (DMG): +10 to Stealth, immunity to scrying & divination

Troudar, goliath Samurai
-Many Styles: Gain an additional fighting style
-Style mastery: Numerical bonuses granted by fighting styles are doubled. Once only.
-Goliath: Lasting Endurance. Stone’s Endurance is no longer limited to once per short rest. Instead, it may be used until a 1 is rolled on the 1d12 before requiring a rest to recover. note: He has never actually used Stone's Endurance. We forget to remind him.
-Undetectability (DMG): +10 to Stealth, immunity to scrying & divination

Saqwam, Tortle Warlock, currently a Planetar
-Boon of Consuming Darkness: You gain resistance to radiant damage and immunity to the Blinded condition. You may cast Darkness once per day as a 5th-level spell, and can see through magical darkness.
-Master's Gift: +1 spell slot, or +1 Mystic Arcanum up to 8th level
-Tortle: Hardshell. Whenever you take damage from any source except psychic, the damage taken is reduced by 3.
-Undetectability (DMG): +10 to Stealth, immunity to scrying & divination
-Boon of Epic Spellcasting:
Once per day, you may apply the “Epic” descriptor when you cast a spell of 8th level or lower. The effects of applying this descriptor are determined by the DM. General guidelines for what an “Epic” version of a spell can do:
• If the spell deals damage, triple the damage dice OR
• If the spell deals damage, the damage is maximized and all targets automatically fail the save
• Apply two metamagics to the casting of the spell
• If the spell does not deal damage and targets enemies, all targets have disadvantage on the save, and must re-roll their highest roll (double disadvantage)
• If the spell heals or buffs allies, increase the numerical effect by 50%.
• The spell may be used to do something it cannot usually do (Examples: an Epic Floating Disc is bigger and can be ridden like a Carpet of Flying; an Epic Dispel can instead be used to suppress all magic items on the target for 1d4+1 rounds; an Epic Counterspell succeeds and renders the target unable to cast spells for 1d3 rounds). Sufficiently powerful enemies may ignore some of these effects.

Undetectability frees up an attunement slot, as everyone has been using the Amulets of Protection from Detection & Location for a long time. I am pretty sure someone will take it.

[J-H]

Session 40: 3/18/2023

Ratel and Troudar took the Epic Boon of Undetectability (+10 Stealth, immune to scrying/divination). This frees up an attunement slot and gives them two spare Amulets of Protection from Detection and Location. Teador takes the Boon of Recovery, so he can heal half his HP as a bonus action once per day. Saqwam takes an extra Mystic Arcanum and takes Circle of Death.

After some discussion, the party Teleports to the stone where the Crystal Sword had been. They then fly west to the largest Giant city. Teador rides his griffon with 1 passenger (speed 80’) while Saqwam, still a Planetar, uses his fly speed of 120’ and carries the other PC. They make good time overland. As they travel, Saqwam the temporary Planetar and Teador the 20th-level Paladin who can sprout wings bicker over who is actually more Good and holy.
Troudar, as a Goliath, knows the pass-phrases to unlock one of the concealed stone doors.

This city is partly segregated based on size, for the safety of all the Goliaths who are only knee-high to the Giants. Troudar leads the group to a Goliath bar and gets some beer and asks some questions. They look for someone who’s interested in adventure, and get referred to a young Golitath named Fui-Fui, who works at a fletcher’s, at least for now. The general mood they get is that nobody is very worried at this point.

Saqwam, still a planetar with wings, waited outside because he was too big, and because Teador declined to Dispel the True Polymorph when asked earlier. A Stone Giant named Ha’aheo approaches him and pokes his wing, and asks how he got them. I ran this straight off the two-sentence description in the city listing, with Ha’aheo being obsessed with getting wings and being able to fly. Saqwam said something about learning magic to fly or get wings, with the Giant responding that he was told he didn’t have any talent for learning magic. I don’t precisely recall how the conversation went, but one line was something to the effect of: “How can I learn the magic that you learned, when I’m not good at learning magic and you said you didn’t learn your magic by studying, but learned it without learning it?”
By the end of the conversation, Ha’aheo is planning to head east to find Oztalun and make a deal to become a warlock, and has directions for how to do so. Saqwam lets Oztalun know to be on the lookout for him.

The others leave the bar, and Teador dispels the True Polymorph after Saqwam has successfully recruited someone to his Aboleth cult.

Instead of seeking out Fui-Fui, the group decides to approach the city leaders. I briefly recap what they know about the government structure and how the leadership is consensus-based and very slow moving. They get to the government area, and I run it similar to a City Council, where they have to sign in, indicate what they wish to speak about, and then wait for their turn.
Hours pass. The discussions are very boring.

Eventually, it’s their turn, and they get called up to discuss getting the giants to go to war, which hasn’t happened in 1500 years.

They make an initial pitch and say they have evidence. A cloud giant named Pono is tasked with taking and reviewing their evidence to make a report. I used the XGTE name tables as recommended in the Demographics section a lot this time! Pono calls in some experts, including a Goliath sage who questions the group, and a cloud giant Lore Bard named Fef, who has a big magnifying glass for small documents. After doing his review, he points out that these are mostly personal letters, and that there’s something there, but not much in conclusive evidence. He can learn more with Legend Lore, but isn’t prepared to cast it today.

Teador opens his pack and pulls out a scroll of Legend Lore, handing it to the giant. I don’t even have in my notes when they got it, but it’s been a while! Fef casts the spell, and once he’s done, looks very worried. The wording on Legend Lore is pretty clear that it can reveal secrets and unknown things, and especially if you start from a position of high information, you get good unknown details. He consults with Pono, and messages are sent to ask sages and others with access to appropriate magic to try to double-check this, so that a consensus report can be presented rather than that of a single loremaster. The party is informed that this will take days.

When they meet with Fef the next day, he mentions having pulled out and read a couple of books on war the previous night – as they have been free of major organized war for 1,500 years, or a few generations. How, exactly, does the party propose to maintain a “supply chain” (whatever magic item that is, it’s not defined), and how do they expect the giants to travel 200 miles overland without being detected and bombarded from the sky?

The party starts discussing options, along with the duration and size limits of Teleport, Teleport Circle, Wind Walk, Transport Via Plants, etc. Ssword volunteers that there may still be a hidden Teleport Circle under the High Temple in the main Aarakocra city. However, it’s in a basement behind a thick stone wall, and only connects to a tunnel that goes out into the nearby lake. It’s not viable to bring Giants in that way.

They continue noodling on the problem, and Saqwam decides to ask his patron. Warlock-Patron communication is very much a grey area, but Aboleths seem telepathic-ish, and he’s a 20th level Warlock, so it makes sense that they can talk. Oztalun says it will get back to Saqwam the next day.

The next day, it does send him a message with an area to check on the map, mentioning an old document where someone had copied runes related to teleportation on a drawing… and the document eventually came to him. Aboleths remember everything.

It’s in one of the areas the party hasn’t been to, so they teleport in a couple of hexes away and travel there. There’s some joking about never getting random encounters, and this time when I roll the d8s, they get one. Saqwam’s player specifically jokes about the giant snakes and… I roll the giant snake.

It bites him out of the air and swallows him in a surprise round. The fight commences, and on his turn, Saqwam declares that he True Polymorphs into an Ancient Brass Dragon. Had he gone with a Large dragon, the snake would have still had him in its belly. A gargantuan dragon in a gargantuan snake? That’s too much. The snake is declared dead.

They find a 20’ diameter adamantium ring, marked with arcane runes related to planar travel, specifically to the Ethereal Plane. It’s ¾ buried. The solution to “how do you dig it out?” is that Teador’s Quake Plate allows him to cast Move Earth once per day. That dug it out.

Moving it is a bit harder. It’s too big to teleport, and too bulky and heavy to carry unless Saqwam wants to fly as a dragon for 150 miles. Ultimately, they use the Anyspell Tome to cast Reduce on it, which shrinks it to 10’ across, and Teleport it to Oztalun’s lair. It will take two weeks to prepare.

They then teleport out to visit a Yuan-ti village in 15.09 to try to get the sigil sequence for the hidden Teleport Circle under the temple.

DM note: That was about 2 ½ hours at the table, with ½ round of combat. Further battles aside from random encounters are mostly at their discretion, as they are invisible to scrying and move about too much to be easily attacked. Since they’ve been concealing their location so well, the Aarakocra don’t even have much to go on in terms of going after the Yuan-ti or other supporting groups, aside from getting lucky – which I am reluctant to have happen too often.

They actually got TWO random encounters. The second one is some Shadow Cats stalking them at night and reporting their position back so they can be attacked. The Cats managed to stay hidden, but the party solved the problem so quickly that the attack force never got a chance to form up and reach them. With several “teleport and kill” teams having failed, this one would have been 10+ air-skiffs and about 400 soldiers, including a newly-inducted High Priest of Tezcatlipoca able to cast Power Word: Kill.

At this point, the duration of the campaign is entirely up to what firepower and forces they want to have show up at the same time as them for the final battle in the city. We’ve discussed that these will be handled ‘off-screen’ rather than rolled in the fight, but will determine enemy response times, forces and reinforcements available, alertness, etc. They want to stack the deck on this fight, and I think that will also serve them well in terms of preparing for the question of “what happens after we win?”

[J-H]

Against the Idol of the Sun is posted for sale on the DM's Guild! Not sure if I'm allowed to link it in my own thread, but it's under the same name there as here. The preview packet includes a lot, including the campaign log up to Session 40. I'll update it with the full log once we're done, which should be around Session 43.

Session 41: 4/1/2023

The party is escorted directly to the leader of the Yuan-ti village, who is happy to see them…they are important, and Teador is trailed by a number of people as he carries the Ssword of Sseth. It will take a few days to find someone who may have records of the Teleport Circle under the high temple, but they think it can be done.

There is some discussion of how to get the Yuan-ti to the final battle. They can sneak to the area in the jungle in small groups, but will need to know when to go, and what to do. They aren’t suited for open field battle. It will take two weeks for the teleport ring to be ready, so they decide to have the Yuan-ti check in with them once per day with Sending, and will count on the Yuan-ti’s long-established internal communication channels to distribute word from there.

There is a logistical problem – nobody in the party can cast Sending. If they get the giants to agree to come and fight, and set up the ring as a destination for the Teleport Circle spell that will fit the giants (unlike the under-temple one)… how do the giants know when to cast the spell from 100 miles away and come through? They travel south to the next Yuan-ti hex and recruit Priya to come with them. Nobody specifically asks about her spell list, but she definitely has Sending, Invisibility, and Teleport Circle.

There’s discussion of how to get the portal ring in place in the Aarakocra city. Options discussed true polymorphing into a dragon, getting turned Invisible, and flying it in, as well as shrinking it, Teleporting in, and setting it up, or carrying it in on/under a stolen air-skiff.

The group returns to the giant city via Helm of Teleportation and meets with Pono and Fef, who look very concerned. In the absence of the party, a very large Aarakocra force showed up and issued an ultimatum: If the giants work with the party, the Aarakocra will return and bombard the city, killing everyone there.

The PCs are immune to scrying and divination…. But the Giants are not. It is still 12 days until the portal ring is ready. Extended discussions ensue, with thoughts of diversionary strikes, hitting the capital early, trying to defend the city, bag of holding bombing raids, and the like. The final choice is that the giants officially kick out the players and refuse to work with them.
Unofficially, Fef is a point of contact for Sending and will spread the word. There will be some volunteers acting in a non-endorsed individual capacity when the party is ready to go in two weeks. It’s a reduction in their force, but better than nothing. They make a mediocre Deception check with advantage showing disappointment and leave. If they’re lucky, this will be enough to fool the divination spells the Aarakocra are using.

Teador has the party take a couple of days doing a sweep of the hexes around the city looking for any enemy Forward Operating Bases. None are found. After some discussion, they decide to kill time by hunting enemy patrols to thin their numbers until the ring is ready.

They use the Ssacred Library of Sseth (very well hidden, within 2 hexes of the enemy capital) as a teleport destination, and start traveling around, looking for enemy patrols. There’s no way they can’t win, and over a few days, they wipe out 3 patrols (3 air-skiffs and 30-something enemies) in 3 hexes. Saqwam snags a few priest souls to interrogate with Soul Cage, but doesn’t verify much new information. They continue their search, but the next patrol they run across is six air-skiffs and 70-something Aaracokra.

The group decides that it’s too much to take on, and that they should leave… but Teador wants to use Chain Lightning from his ring first to thin them out. It has a range of 150’ and hits several enemies. By this point, Ratel’s player has had to drop off Discord for the evening, so nobody has anything longer ranged.

They hide in the path of the enemy force, but not well enough. They are spotted. The air-skiffs hold back, and the enemy force spreads out in two wings to encircle them completely, before advancing all at once. When they hit 150’, we roll initiative to see who is fastest off the mark with spellfire.

With 72 enemies, I am not tracking individual spells or HP. Instead, I use multiples of 6 to determine how many enemies of each type, and then decide that they’re spaced equally around.

Saqwam opens with Circle of Death. I do some quick math on a 150’ diameter circle, and it hits around 1/7th, or about 10 of them. Unfortunately, the damage on a failed save is about 24, so it doesn’t kill any enemies.

Troudar the fighter is next. He dodges, as he has no weapons long-enough range to hit.

I look at the spell lists for the enemy senior and junior priests, and rather than splitting things up, have them all advance 30’ to a range of 120’, and eighteen castings of Fireball fly at the party.
Fireball’s average damage is 27, with a Dex DC of 12-16 depending on caster.
I have everybody roll 4 dex saves to see how they do. Teador and Troudar pass all 4, and Saqwam fails one save.

Using D&D rounding (down), Teador takes 27 x .5 (passed saves) -> 13 x .5 (fire resistant) -> 6 damage per Fireball. 18 x 6 = 108 damage.

Troudar is not fire resistant, and 13 x 18 is 234, so he is reduced to 0hp.

Saqwam takes more than 234hp in damage and is killed (reduced to 0 then plenty of hits).
Troudar, as a Samurai, can take a full turn when reduced to 0. He uses Second Wind, then grabs the other two and activates his Helm of Teleportation. Teador Revivifies Saqwam.

Teador rolled poorly on initiative, and never got to go. It was a short fight.

It’s only 3 days until the portal ring will be ready, so the party puts things in motion – they use the next check-in to tell the Yuan-ti to move, and they send Saqwam and Troudar to teleport to the west coast to call the Kraken’s name and wait for him to arrive, so that he will be ready to be teleported to the battle site.

Next session will be sitting down with the map of the enemy capital city and planning what they will do in what order to kick things off, and then we’ll start the final battle.

Everyone gets an epic boon for getting the plan in place and lining up allies. No choices have been made yet.

DM Notes: Another 2.5 hour session. I’d rather do longer sessions, especially for the Big Finale.
18 Fireballs was hilarious. There should be 2 sessions left, unless they decide to change plans or something.

[Chrizzt]

I've logged in for the first time in years, because I want to say thank you for the exciting log, and the effort that went into it. I'm sure there are many more avid readers like me (who are more into reading than into posting), and I wanted to give back at least some good energy. I'm very much looking forward to the big showdown. :)

[J-H]

Thank you!

Session 41: 4/15/2023
Epic boons selected:
Troudar: Fighting Style: Blind Fighting.
Ratel: Hearing the Air, blindsense 30’ when not deaf
Teador: Aura of Blades, allies within 30’ do +PB force damage with attacks
Saqwam: Epic Spellcasting

We were able to start earlier tonight, leading to a session that lasted close to 4 hours for once. Roughly the first two hours were spent putting together an attack plan as a group. I gave them the list of questions / things I needed to know, and we got them checked off one by one, including the logistical issues. There was some back and forth, as the kraken didn’t want to be the first one in. The final plan, which they had 3 days to set up before the teleport ring was ready:

1. Priya, the Yuan-ti wizard, gets the party’s Helm of Teleportation. She collects the (Reduced) teleportation gate from Oztalun’s lair, then teleports to the west coast to meet with Huizhong the kraken.

2. They attack at sunset, when the enemy troops are back and their air-skiffs have mostly landed for the night. With the help of some Yuan-ti (spellcasting and troops), they use the Teleport Circle hidden in the bottom of the temple from when it belonged to Sseth, and enter the city.

3. After one minute passes, Priya will teleport to the city, using the pebble the party’s Silver Raven figurine retrieved as a material focus. She will bring Huizhong with her, with the kraken carrying the gate. The Teleport spell makes no restrictions on the size of creatures teleported, or the size of anything they bring as long as it is a carried object, and a STR 30 kraken can certainly carry a 3500lb gate. She will land near the edge of a large square stone building near the temple. The gate can be leaned up against the wall, and she will then use Sending to contact the giants who are unofficially coming to help. They can use it as a focus for a long-duration Teleport Circle and flood through, while Huizhong moves to the water and engages nearby Aarakocra with his lightning bolts, 30’ tentacles, etc.

4. One the main battle kicks off (loud noises, obvious battle magic), the Yuan-ti along the edge of the city will begin attacking. With the paladin’s input, their direction is to kill anything that resists them, but to not destroy the city.

5. Assuming victory, enemy survivors will be allowed to surrender. Ssword will allow surrendered Aarakocra to worship him, and will allow most of them to even retain their property within the city… after all, his new empire will be stronger with more subjects and more species, and he’s no longer a Yuan-ti chauvinist. However, any who enslaved Yuan-ti, participated in sacrifices, etc., will have their guilt verified (magically) and will be executed with no exceptions. Harsh but fair justice.

For the interior of the temple, I keep rough track of how many rounds it’s taking, and don’t worry about specific attack rolls. A 20th level party backed up by 12+ Yuan-ti assassins, wizards, and Abominations can bring down some AC 16-18/HP 30-90 guards very fast at range.

The party teleports into the temple, and Teador sets up Aura of Power, which gives advantage on saves and an evasion-type on all “save for half” things for all allies within 30’. This lasts for 10 minutes as long as he maintains concentration. The Teleport Circle is indeed functional and hidden, albeit dusty. One way out of the room leads down to the lake outside in an underwater passage. The other way out is a short set of stairs that lead to a blank stone wall. Examination determines that this is indeed a mortared-shut wall, not a hidden door. They have the Yuan-ti use Sending, and get someone who can cast Stone Shape sent along in the next group teleport to the circle. They lose some time due to this.

Emerging, they shoot some guards at long distance, break down a magically locked door, and go upstairs. They follow the same pattern for the next four floors up, making a beeline for the stairs and killing anything in their way. The Yuan-ti split off in groups to deal with any other guards. I think the only time they ever got off the direct route was breaking down a locked armory door, seeing what’s inside, and telling their followers to grab any better gear they found.

After around a minute and a half, they emerge on the outside of the temple, just below the 50’x50’ roof section that the animated Idol (avatar) of Huitzopochtli is on. They can see giants coming out of the portal and throwing spears and stones at the Aarakocra around them, as well as Huizhong firing lightning bolts at other enemies. They also see a couple of beams of golden light shoot down from above, striking the kraken and burning it.

Initiative is rolled, and the Idol goes first. It walks over to where the party is and blasts down at them with Sunburst, which Saqwam counter-spells, then several shots of golden 6d8 radiant light from its spear tip, and a mote from Crown of Stars. It backs up.
Saqwam pops up on his Broom of Flying and casts Circle of Death to greatly weaken a lot of the enemies, but the Idol counterspells it.

The senior priests use Harm, but both targets save, and Aura of Power means save for half becomes save for none, causing 2 7th level spells to be completely wasted. Ratel shoots one of the priests for substantial damage. The High Priest stays near the middle and casts Holy Aura, giving attacks against every ally of its within 30’ disadvantage. Troudar attacks whatever is near him 4 times and does a lot of damage. The Ahuitzotls climb up from the lower tier; Saqwam doesn’t start drowning, but one does manage to grapple him. Teador uses his action to sprout spectral wings, and creates a 1 minute aura. Any enemy approaching to within 30’ of him, or starting its turn within 30’ of him, has to make a DC 20 Wisdom save or be frightened, having disadvantage on attack rolls and such. This causes a lot of misses in round 2.

The Idol takes no legendary actions in Round 1 because nobody has come up to it yet.

The Idol approaches the edge again at the beginning of Round 2 and attacks the party, firing a mote, some blasts from its spear, and casting Black Blade of Disaster. Teador gets good use from his one casting of Shield (from a feat?) and blocks both spectral blades as well as some other damage.

Saqwam True Polymorphs into a Balor, ending the grapple. He flies up and over to get out of melee (for now), and eats whatever hits out of 4 readied Guiding Bolts from the Sun Acolytes on the top level. Ratel uses his Eclipse hammer to cast Darkness on the hammer, and moves up to the top level. It takes an action to cast the spell, so he doesn’t get to do any damage. The enemy High Priest, lacking good targets for AOE spells, Dispels the Darkness, then attacks him once. The Slayers make a huge flurry of attacks, but most are at disadvantage so it’s a lot of misses. Troudar kills one of them, then starts in on the next one. The Idol hits Ratel with another golden beam for damage – actually, for a 72-damage crit until we remember the adamantium skeleton plating. Teador flies up with Ssword, declares Vow of Enmity, and attacks twice, dumping smite slots and both Inflict Wounds from Ssword while also getting himself Healed (I should have put a 1x/round limitation on Ssword’s spells). He does about 140 damage to the Idol, who reacts in surprise. The attacks also burst two of the ten hearts around Huitzopochtli’s neck. Ssword comments that he’s been waiting about 300 years for this.

We end here due to time.

DM Notes: If another Epic Boon came along, Troudar could take one that would double the numerical benefits of his fighting styles, including the range of Blind Fighting. The better blindsense option Ratel got is thanks to being an elf.

I discouraged splitting the party in their planning for the final battle.

There would ordinarily be enemy reinforcements coming from within the temple and around it, but their plan has neatly drawn those reinforcements off, or tied up in-temple ones (amounting to another 15-20 enemies) up with Yuan-ti.

Opposition is:
1 idol
1 high priest
2 senior priests
1 gray guard – a swordsman with magic armor and a Defender +3 sword set to defend, so he has AC 25, action surge, and 3-4 attacks per round. This was a “if the battle is going to be too easy, insert this” option, and I opted to delete him before he engaged the party.
4 sun acolytes (5th level priests)
4 champions
4 slayers (dual short-sword wielders with good damage and resistances)
Lower on the temple: 2 Ahuitzotls (drown-causing dogs) and 1 War Priest.

This is on the high end of how many enemies I want to run. I have them divided into 4 initiative blocks, and the casters are generally all casting the same spell on their turns.

I felt bad about having Counterspelled the Circle of Death. He was pretty disappointed, but that’s high level D&D caster play. I should have reminded him that he can Counterspell a Counterspell, but I didn’t think of it.

Lack of AOE damage is making this drag out a lot. The other test party opened with Meteor Swarm and a chain of Counterspells, although I did beef up the non-magical guards after that by adding 4 Slayers.
If they can bring down the idol, a lot of the weaker enemies will drop dead. They planned all the lead up to the battle, but not the battle itself. Out of 8 player turns, 4 have resulted in net 0 damage to enemies (Counterspell, True Polymorph, cast Darkness, pop Paladin wings/fear aura). Teador’s aura was probably worth it, as it’s causing a lot of misses.

I still think they’ll win, but it’ll probably be 3-4 rounds, maybe less if they get their act together and focus on primary targets instead of trying to individually kill every single guard.

[J-H]

Session 42: 5/7/2023
This is it, the final session!

We picked back up mid-battle, at the top of the round. The Idol of Huitzopochtli attacks Teador, who’s flying next to him, 3 times. He misses either 2 or 3 times, starting a trend that continued all night long. Teador had Ssword and was doing most of the damage to him, so he was a primary target, including for many off-turn Legendary attacks. The Idol got Nat1s on at least 5 attacks versus Teador, as well as a large number of 2s, 3s, and 4s. I was using my good dice, too. The Idol also casts Blade Barrier along the wall to split the attacking force in half. This ultimately proves, if anything, counter-productive. It’s high along the edge to hit Teador, which means Saqwam and Troudar are below it and unaffected. Ratel doesn’t retreat through it, and Teador’s Circle of Power spell means he takes no damage on successful saves. Meanwhile, standing in Blade Barrier gives ¾ cover, or +5 to AC. Teador spent much of the fight either in the Blade Barrier, or returning to it for the extra AC.

At initiative count 20, I decide that the kraken down below will take a few pot-shots, and lightning bolts from it hit the war priest who’d be most visible from its location, doing 30-something damage. Saqwam (in Balor form) attacks twice, doing some damage to a couple of enemies, and drawing some melee attacks on himself. Troudar works on hammering his way through the Slayers hemming him in, dropping a very consistent 20-30 damage per hit x 9 hits in a row with Action Surge and Fighting Spirit. Teador goes for the Idol, bursting one of the 10 hearts every time he strikes it with Ssword. The hearts power Legendary Resistance, and also can be used (once per round) to heal the Idol 100hp. Teador crits, and the idol heals the next round. Teador used his Epic Boon of Recovery to heal himself 107hp (half HP) either this round or the next round. Ratel tries to hit the High Priest and the Idol, but the High Priest’s Aura of Power causing disadvantage, and Legendary Resistances, are too much for his Stunning Fist to overcome. One of the priests tries to Dispel the “person turning into a Balor” they saw. A high roll is needed, and I roll in front of the DM screen so everyone can see it. Nat 20.

The next round, the Idol attacks Teador again, and also hits Ratel once. I don’t recall what spell it cast, but whatever it was, it wasn’t very effective. Ratel goes down from the Idol’s 2d12 fire aura at the start of his turn, and spends much of the remainder of the combat healing 2hp (troll heart) and then going back down from the aura.
Troudar does more damage but gets knocked to 0, using his Samurai ability to power through a full turn, kill his attacker, and heal himself with Fighting Spirit. At init 20, the kraken contributes a bit more lightning damage.

I believe it was this round where Saqwam’s player turned the tide of the fight. He had pre-selected Wish as the book in the Anyspell Tome, and used it to cast Antipathy. Wish means the casting is instant instead of 1 hour. He cast it on the Idol, specifying Aarakocra. Antipathy has no save, and causes any of the affected creatures who come within 60’ of the target, or who can see it, to need to make a (DC 20) Wisdom save or be frightened and forced to use their actions to move away. If they move more than 60’ away AND cannot see it, they can start making saves against the effect. The idol is glowing quite brightly and visible at a long distance, and is located in the open on the tallest building in the city. Aarakocra fly. This affected the entire enemy force of thousands of troops. Over the next round, almost every single enemy on the top of the temple failed their Wisdom saves. Only two Slayers, one Senior Priest, 2 Acolytes, and the High Priest were left.

Teador ends up flying around the Idol to the High Priest and dumping a 4th-level smite, plus having Ssword cast Harm on the priest to shatter his concentration with 80-something damage and taking down the Holy Aura that was inflicting disadvantage on far too many attack rolls.

The next couple of rounds were a slugging match between a critting, smiting paladin with impeccable Concentration and an artifact sword, and a deific avatar of a war god who rarely rolled higher than a 4. Troudar had to stay out of range of the aura due to low HP for a round or so until the Idol moved away, but still scored some damage with javelins. Saqwam used his Epic Spellcasting boon to cast Finger of Death for triple damage. The Idol made the save, but half of 21d6+90 is still 83 damage. This time on initiative count 20, with the entire enemy force in disarray, I asked if the party had discussed getting help in their planning phase. They settled on “Yes,” so Priya teleported onto the temple with two Giants (using spellcasting statblocks I had in place already) to help. I rolled for Teleport and they were off-target, but since it was a 500’ teleport, they only arrived about 90’ off-target. One giant hasted the other, and a Hasted Rune Knight Stone Giant showed up to miss every single attack he made… but he drew some attacks.

Somewhere in here, Teador gets Ssword to use its Mass Healing Word ability, helping Troudar and Ratel heal more.

The Idol tried to go after Saqwam for casting Antipathy, but Sentinel + crit meant that the Idol’s movement was stopped and more damage was dealt. The Idol later went after Saqwam using a legendary action to move, which let Troudar come up and start hammering at the High Priest, while Ratel was finally able to get up on his turn. Teador spent his turn burning 100hp of Lay on Hands on himself and followed the Idol, trying to get an attack from Sentinel or Vow of Enmity. The Idol cast Black Blade of Disaster (for the second time this evening; the first had only one hit for 9 damage due to fickle d12s), but missed Saqwam with both. It took a swing at Teador, and he hit it yet again with Ssword, bursting the next-to-last heart and reducing the Idol to 0hp. Ssword, which had been glowing greener and brighter throughout the fight, emitted a green flash, and transformed into a 2’ long jade green snake with iridescent green eyes as the idol stopped glowing. “Huitzopochtli, don’t you know that not all dead things stay dead?”

Every remaining enemy within a few hundred feet instantly took 100hp of poison damage. The party spent the next round finishing off the High Priest, who attempted to cast Prismatic Wall, but whose spell failed to go off as his connection to his god was temporarily disrupted. Ratel brought him low, and Troudar finished off the high priest and the Slayer.

The party could then fly around the city, with Ssword dealing 100 poison damage to every fighting Aarakocra within a few hundred feet every round. They specifically note that those not bearing arms are unharmed. Between that and the temporary loss of clerical spellcasting, the yuan-ti, party, and the giants are able to mop things up over the next hour or two.

The reborn Sseth proclaims a new government under his guidance, albeit one that will allow the Aarakocra who surrender and obey to retain both their lives and property, and which accepts other species.

The Aarakocra still have other gods, but they have all lost much power, as well as their organization. There is plenty of mop-up and other fighting, but nothing that the players can’t spearhead with their superior skill and firepower. Remnants of Huitzopochtli’s followers will trouble the new empire for the next 20-40 years, slowly retreating into the mountains.

The non-Huitzopochtli-following Aarakocra in the mountains remain as they are, although they can trade with the yuan-ti-run empire and their neighbors safely now.

The new empire accepts all species. It is lawful, but not tyrannical as the old Yuan-Ti-supremacist empire was. There is justice and law, but also freedom and some toleration, as reflects Ssword’s shift to a Lawful Neutral alignment and new values.

With Sseth restored, the Yuan Ti’s demographic problem goes away, and they no longer suffer a 90% failure rate with birthing male children. They reclaim their old cities, but end up sharing them with the subdued but more numerous Aarakocra.

Oztalun is not happy that Saqwam failed in his mission, but remains safe in the dark in his lair. Huitzopchtli winning would have been substantially worse for his plans.

The Tortles along the coast can stop living in fear, and live more peaceful lives.

The party didn’t interact much with the Scorpionfolk, so there wasn’t much of their impact to show there.

The giants suffer some internal political turmoil over the “unofficial” help that was given in a major war action, as it risked one of their cities. As the outcome was good, it is not anything that causes problems for anyone else.

The player characters are rich, powerful, revered by the Yuan-ti, and respected by others. Whatever they want to do, they can do it, and everything they say and do may be written down for history.

Ratel decides to stay in the area and found a new monastery, spending a few centuries training Yuan-ti and Aarakocra monks.

Saqwam is appointed by Ozatalun as the aboleth’s ambassador to the new empire. He travels around and finds likely converts, sending them to Oztalun to learn and serve. After a while, he is joined by his new apprentice… a stone giant who is very happy to learn Levitate at will when he reaches level 9. Saqwam eventually learns about the Chuul the party had earlier encountered, and connects them with Oztalun.

Teador decides to return to Europe. Being rich, famous, and regionally powerful isn’t anything new to him.

Troudar considers himself a mercenary and doesn’t want to get tied down. When Teador offers, he decides to go see this Europe as well, although he warns that his actions may not always line up with Teador’s values.

DM Notes: What a ride! I was worried for a while that this was going to be a TPK. The dice were nuts. The Idol missed a lot, and Teador scored many critical hits. The battle was slightly too tough (partly due to their own choices, like Ratel never turning on his ability that gives him invisibility and resistance to most damage), but they pulled it off. The use of Antipathy was absolutely a genius move that I would never have thought of.

Circle of Power and a +15 Constitution save is also a really all-star combo in terms of damage prevention.

If you’re going to run this campaign, note that the final battle is intentionally written to be very difficult, and the difficulty needs to be calibrated to the number of players and their skill and abilities. A party with combat healing or a 5th player would have had a much easier time.

The End

Thanks for reading!
The preview packet on the DM's Guild will have the campaign log updated in the next couple of days. If you're a "download and save kind of person", the entire log is there in PDF format as part of the "preview" so people can know what they're getting in to.

[Kol Korran]

Hey.
I just wanted to thank you for sharing this excellent (and unique!) log, and thank you for providing "behind the screen" glimpses into the DMing process.

Sounds like an excellent campaign! I applaud you and your players (and frankly? i envy them for having the experience!). Sounds like a great ride!

So thank you, and kudos to you and your players! :)