Session #16
Ok, this session was slightly different.
But, we'll get to that later.
:)
Right now I've got to plug my favorite new game show. It's on Comedy Central it's called Distraction. Basically contestants have to answer easy questions while bad things are happening to them. My favorite one is where they break a bottle over your head before you get to answer the question. Then they've got the old lady armwrestling and so on. Yeah, I'm a sadistic bastage.
I did get a few more questions recently so I'll be getting to them:
- Why do you put new posts in stages and on different days?
Well I try to have it done by Sunday. But sometimes it just takes forever to get everything relevant into the blog (there's a lot that doesn't get put in - for your own good). Plus I'm distracted by a lot of things while I'm writing the blog (TV/wife/cats). Overall the time can get up to 6 hours.
- You're kind of mean to your players aren't you?
Your point being? I get just as good as I give. If I was truly that mean, do you think they'd show up every week? The running joke for the past 2 decades is that I have charisma of 6 (some consider that generous). My goal is not to be mean, it's to be challenging. I am not a cake walk kind of DM. I love to challenge the players with anything I can throw at them. And so long as they are sufficiently rewarded, they like the challenge.
- What are your house rules, because your combats don't mesh with the rules all the time?
Well first, the combats I relate on the blog come from memory, and I'm bound to lose or confuse things along the way. And yes, there are some rules that I have tweaked, but nothing heavy.
- How do you handle cheating?
Cheating? I doubt it in this group. Right now the only way they could cheat is if they were to buy their own copy of the WLD. That's some expensive cheating.
Even assuming that the someone were to have the WLD, this group isn't the kind that would cheat. Cheating means no challenge. No challenge means boredom.
- RPGMP3 has bios of their players. Why don't you?
Man, RPGMP3 gets all the love.
Ok here ya go (in no particular order)
Aaron (Krieg)
Age: 32
Marrital Status: married w/ baby daughter
Education: Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering
Played D&D since: 1988 w/ 1st Ed. AD&D
Other RPGs: Aeon, Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Druid
Favorite Movie: The Usual Suspects or Reservoir Dogs
Least Favorite: Crump
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Circe the wild mage
Favorite D&D Monster: Kerspa the intelligent squirrel
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: The people
Least liked: 3rd Ed. psionics
Jeff (Valden)
Age: 35
Marrital Status: Married w/ baby son
Education: Bachelor's in Computer Engineering
Played D&D since: 1999 on a PC later with 3.0
Other RPGs: n/a
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Highlander 2: The Sickening
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Valimir the wizard/rogue
Favorite D&D Monster: Gelatinous cube
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Combat Strategy
Least liked: Low Rolls
Justin (Thunderclease)
Age: 20
Marrital Status: Single
Education: High w/ some college
Played D&D since: 2002 with 3.0
Other RPGs: n/a
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Least Favorite D&D Class: Cleric
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Jeepers Creepers
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Lyle Highill halfling rogue
Favorite D&D Monster: Anything that is not a gorgon
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Logic
Least liked: XP penalty for multiclassing.
Brian (Torin/Dugan)
Age: 27
Marrital Status: Married
Education: Bachelor's in Latin Education
Played D&D since: 1993 with 2nd Ed.
Other RPGs: Rifts, Harn, Earthdawn, Star Wars (d6)
Favorite D&D Class: Paladin
Least Favorite D&D Class: Monk
Favorite Movie: Empire Strikes Back
Least Favorite: About Schmidt (Kathy Bates scene)
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Aximander aasimar paladin/cleric
Favorite D&D Monster: Molydeus demon prince
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Friends made through the game
Least liked: Too much math to deal with at times.
Dale (Dalron)
Age: 48
Marrital Status: Married w/ a teenage son & a daughter in college
Education: Bachelors in Business (Accounting)
Played D&D since: 1978 with blue book D&D
Other RPGs: Mage, Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Kelly's Heroes
Least Favorite: Love Story
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Air Shane
Favorite D&D Monster: Lich (Dale loves undead)
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Interaction with other players
Least liked: Players who take the game too seriously
Joe (Zorak)
Age: 27
Marrital Status: Single
Education: Bachelor's in Urban Planning
Played D&D since: July 2004 w/ 3.5
Other RPGs: Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Least Favorite D&D Class: Paladin
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Titanic
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Brak Stonebreaker dwarf fighter
Favorite D&D Monster: Goblin
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Role-playing
Least liked: Munchkins (even though he is one)
Here's his personal blog.
Read it if you want to understand Joe. Or watch a couple of 5 year olds after giving them each a candy bar. That's Joe too.
Sean (Lord Ao)
Age: 32
Marrital Status: Married
Education: Associates in Electronic Engineering
Played D&D since: 1984 with basic red book D&D
Other RPGs: Star Wars (d6), Marvel Super-heroes, Dr. Who, Teenagers From Outer Space, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dragon Storm, Middle Earth, and 4 billion more I've forgotten
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Dumb & Dumber
Least Favorite: Tie for Fargo and Left Behind (Tarantino movies suck too :) )
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Kri'Lahn human druid/ranger
Favorite D&D Monster: Rust monster
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Problem solving (not puzzle solving)
Least liked: Psionics
Map
We last left our group after they snuck back to region E after the big fight in room I17. (Later on I was told it was reminiscent of the "game over man!" scene from Aliens.)
The party rested and Dalron and Valden leveled to 7th.
Room I17: The party returns to the scene of the slime. They resume searching the rooms. Eventually they find a key being grasped by a bony drow hand.
Room I19: Three dead drow are setup here back to back almost as if to show them off. The party finds a signet ring on 2 of the drow. One has a symbol on it, but the group has no clue what it means. The other has the symbol of Lolth.
Room I29: Thunderclease's poor Spot skill nailed him on this one. Each corner of the walls of this 4-way intersection had a trap. When the plate on the intersection was hit, the poor person in the middle gets hit by 4 Burning Hands spells for 3d4 each. Thunderclease took under 20 damage and barely noticed. The unfortunate Dalron was standing behind him. He got blasted by 2 of the traps. He easily made his saves and took 0 damage.
Dalron then took to disarming the traps. He removed 1, then another, then had 2 retry for the other 2. Then again. Then he was blasted by the now reset traps. Once again he saved and took no damage. Then he was able to remove them.
Torin seemed rather disappointed.
Room I34: This room was once a laboratory that looked as if it had been hit by a cataclysmic event. The slime in the room, although still there, was less than the more recent rooms. The party didn't like what they saw, so they left before anything bad may happen.
Room I22: This room made the group go "hmmmm". This room was clean and in fact had a dining table with a complete table setting. The setting was worth up to 250gp, but would have weighed 50 lbs., so they left it alone. Further investigation found them nothing.
Room I21: No slime in this room. It was still a mess though. Furniture lay broken and scattered about. In the corner hanging from the wall, were 10 cloaks. Torin investigated, hoping to find something of magic. Dalron followed closely. Zorak cast Detect Magic.
Well the cloakers didn't like that one bit.
Surprise Round: Torin takes a little damage. Dalron takes a lot. The other cloakers spread about the room trying to keep the party separate. All PCs in range saved versus one the cloaker's moan ability. By the end of the round, every PC has at least one cloaker on them except Krieg. It looked real bad for the party.
Round 1: Didn't go that well for the party either. Dalron got in a sneak attack, but missed and then got smacked hard by the cloakers and dropped. Zorak cast Invisibility on himself. Torin took a swing and jumped out of melee. Thunderclease did his usual damage, but these monsters had 40+ hp. The most Thunderclease has ever done was 48, and that was with a critical hit. Valden casts Divine Power on himself. Krieg casts Prayer. Everyone saves versus another cloaker moan attack.
Round 2: Zorak gets off his Haste spell. Thunderclease rips up a couple cloakers. Valden is now almost as potent as Thunderclease in melee, so he hurts a cloaker pretty bad. The party has turned the combat around.
Round 3-4: By the end of round 4, the combat is pretty much over. The last 4 cloakers know this and flee.
Room I28: This room appeared to have once been a prison, but can no longer serve that purpose. Dalron found an area that previously was magically trapped, but that was all he was able to determine.
Room I23: Two rooms in one. The outer room was the same as the rest of rooms, slimy and gross. The inner room had walls made of crystal. When the party investigated the room they found grafitti written in a language they could not understand & 6 broken shackles. They also swore they could hear a fell creature laughing.
Room I24: This room was so full flesh and slime it made the party nervous. It then made them more nervous when they had to make a DC 15 fortitude save. Later those who failed their save would get Cackle fever for about 2 minutes before it was cured. {yawn}.
The party, in a moment of munchkinism (next time they get a disease I'm making secret saves), turn around and choose another direction.
Room I27: Although this room still had some slime, it appeared as though someone had recently scraped away some of the flesh and slime. The party found a secret door to the north that they had to bash at for 5 minutes to get open. Luckily for them, nothing came to investigate.
Room I36: This room appeared to have had been superheated then cooled giving the walls, ceiling, and floors a volcanic/ropy look. When the party investigated the room a voice spoke:
"To pass beyond these doors, you must answer these questions two, the number of the cursed Twins. The first. Who is the Master of this place?"
Krieg went through the scrolls found in room I14, and gave the answer "Mahir".
The response was, "The second. How many of the Master's brood still live within these haunted corridors?"
The party had no clue on this answer. Valden & Krieg discussed what the answer might be. They agreed that 1 or 0 would probably be the correct answer. So Krieg said 0.
Click. Click. Both doors unlocked {sigh - this isn't the first time the party lucked on the right answer!}.
Room I35: Jackpot! Reagents (spell components) were neatly labels and organized on shelves. Zorak has the feat Eschew Material, so find meant nothing to him. The priests were able to find some incense that they intend to use on an Augury spell.
Room I37: This dark, large, and cube shaped room had a pillar in the center. Investigation by the party determined that the pillar in the center was basalt, the darkness came from the pillar via a Deeper Darkness spell, within 1' of the pillar it was very cold, and on the pillar were several icicles no longer than 3".
Over the north door was a riddle written in Undercommon. "I cannot be seen, cannot be felt, cannot be heard, cannot be smelt. I lie behind the stars and beneath the hills. I end life and kill laughter.
Over the south door was a riddle written in Elvish. "I pass before the despised sun, yet make no shadow. What am I?"
Over the east door was presumable another riddle, but the party could not determine the language or the script.
The party went between the north and south doors, rambling off answers in all languages they could speak. The DM could not roll a random encounter for his life during this time.
Eventually Krieg spoke "Darkness" in Undercommon. And the door opened.
Room I38: The door opened to reveal another door. This door had no handle, only a 1" hole where the handle should be.
This being Dalron's domain, he investigated the door, focusing on the hole. The door was a standard, reinforced iron door (read as not easy to break). The hole seemed almost flesh like (enter your predictable joke here - the party sure did).
Dalron could find no mechanisms the hole.
Thunderclease then bashed the door with his sword. The only effect was for the door to swing 1/2" open then close again & the holy damage from the sword was converted to evil damage and sent back to Thunderclease. He tried again with the same results.
Dalron took his {sigh} 10' pole and shoved it into the hole multiple times (you see what I'm dealing with here people?). The end of the pole had blood on it.
(It's not getting any better either.)
Thunderclease once again threw caution to the wind and stuck his finger in the hole. he found that it was (aw man) warm and sticky and only 4" deep.
The party was about to turn around when Valden had one last idea. He grabbed an icicle from the pillar in room I38 and put it into the hole. The icicle made his hand numb, but it also was they key to the door.
The icicle was a poison. The lock was a living lock. The poison knocked out the lock causing the door to open.
The party saw what the living lock was, at least once was. Currently it was a mutilated and deformed excuse for what was once a male drow. The hole was what was once his eye-socket. Thunderclease attempted to put it out of its misery. For 30 seconds the thing stopped breathing (they could tell because its lungs were easily visible), then it healed up and resumed breathing.
This region just keeps getting better and better don't it?
(To anyone who thinks the group's actions and jokes were juveniles, just remember, we're men without women around. If that's not a sufficient answer for you, then you need to lay off the cough syrup.)
The party then investigates the door to the north. When the door was opened nothing bust dust came flying out of the room. Several of the party members were covered in it, but that is all. Thunderclease investigated the room further alone, but found nothing.
Dalron was able to find a secret door.
Room I39: This room appeared to have some lava damage leaving no apparent exits. Dalron searched around and found another cleverly hidden secret door.
Room I41: This room had not been used in awhile, but the party was able to determined that it was once a religious room meant for relaxation or cleansing of one's aura.
Dalron investigated the door to north. He found the door was locked with a very complicated and fragile lock.
Detect Evil found that the local area was not evil, but there was something faintly evil behind the door.
Zorak has a wand of Knock with 33 charges, but refused to use it. He claimed that the celestials placed the lock here for a reason.
After some arguing, the party returns to room I37 to try to solve the riddle to the southern door. They fail and return to rest in region E and ask the celestials some questions about the lock.
They know nothing of the lock.
What will the party do next week?
But, we'll get to that later.
:)
Right now I've got to plug my favorite new game show. It's on Comedy Central it's called Distraction. Basically contestants have to answer easy questions while bad things are happening to them. My favorite one is where they break a bottle over your head before you get to answer the question. Then they've got the old lady armwrestling and so on. Yeah, I'm a sadistic bastage.
I did get a few more questions recently so I'll be getting to them:
- Why do you put new posts in stages and on different days?
Well I try to have it done by Sunday. But sometimes it just takes forever to get everything relevant into the blog (there's a lot that doesn't get put in - for your own good). Plus I'm distracted by a lot of things while I'm writing the blog (TV/wife/cats). Overall the time can get up to 6 hours.
- You're kind of mean to your players aren't you?
Your point being? I get just as good as I give. If I was truly that mean, do you think they'd show up every week? The running joke for the past 2 decades is that I have charisma of 6 (some consider that generous). My goal is not to be mean, it's to be challenging. I am not a cake walk kind of DM. I love to challenge the players with anything I can throw at them. And so long as they are sufficiently rewarded, they like the challenge.
- What are your house rules, because your combats don't mesh with the rules all the time?
Well first, the combats I relate on the blog come from memory, and I'm bound to lose or confuse things along the way. And yes, there are some rules that I have tweaked, but nothing heavy.
- How do you handle cheating?
Cheating? I doubt it in this group. Right now the only way they could cheat is if they were to buy their own copy of the WLD. That's some expensive cheating.
Even assuming that the someone were to have the WLD, this group isn't the kind that would cheat. Cheating means no challenge. No challenge means boredom.
- RPGMP3 has bios of their players. Why don't you?
Man, RPGMP3 gets all the love.
Ok here ya go (in no particular order)
Aaron (Krieg)
Age: 32
Marrital Status: married w/ baby daughter
Education: Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering
Played D&D since: 1988 w/ 1st Ed. AD&D
Other RPGs: Aeon, Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Druid
Favorite Movie: The Usual Suspects or Reservoir Dogs
Least Favorite: Crump
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Circe the wild mage
Favorite D&D Monster: Kerspa the intelligent squirrel
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: The people
Least liked: 3rd Ed. psionics
Jeff (Valden)
Age: 35
Marrital Status: Married w/ baby son
Education: Bachelor's in Computer Engineering
Played D&D since: 1999 on a PC later with 3.0
Other RPGs: n/a
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Highlander 2: The Sickening
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Valimir the wizard/rogue
Favorite D&D Monster: Gelatinous cube
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Combat Strategy
Least liked: Low Rolls
Justin (Thunderclease)
Age: 20
Marrital Status: Single
Education: High w/ some college
Played D&D since: 2002 with 3.0
Other RPGs: n/a
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Least Favorite D&D Class: Cleric
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Jeepers Creepers
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Lyle Highill halfling rogue
Favorite D&D Monster: Anything that is not a gorgon
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Logic
Least liked: XP penalty for multiclassing.
Brian (Torin/Dugan)
Age: 27
Marrital Status: Married
Education: Bachelor's in Latin Education
Played D&D since: 1993 with 2nd Ed.
Other RPGs: Rifts, Harn, Earthdawn, Star Wars (d6)
Favorite D&D Class: Paladin
Least Favorite D&D Class: Monk
Favorite Movie: Empire Strikes Back
Least Favorite: About Schmidt (Kathy Bates scene)
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Aximander aasimar paladin/cleric
Favorite D&D Monster: Molydeus demon prince
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Friends made through the game
Least liked: Too much math to deal with at times.
Dale (Dalron)
Age: 48
Marrital Status: Married w/ a teenage son & a daughter in college
Education: Bachelors in Business (Accounting)
Played D&D since: 1978 with blue book D&D
Other RPGs: Mage, Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Kelly's Heroes
Least Favorite: Love Story
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Air Shane
Favorite D&D Monster: Lich (Dale loves undead)
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Interaction with other players
Least liked: Players who take the game too seriously
Joe (Zorak)
Age: 27
Marrital Status: Single
Education: Bachelor's in Urban Planning
Played D&D since: July 2004 w/ 3.5
Other RPGs: Vampire
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Least Favorite D&D Class: Paladin
Favorite Movie: Pulp Fiction
Least Favorite: Titanic
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Brak Stonebreaker dwarf fighter
Favorite D&D Monster: Goblin
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Role-playing
Least liked: Munchkins (even though he is one)
Here's his personal blog.
Read it if you want to understand Joe. Or watch a couple of 5 year olds after giving them each a candy bar. That's Joe too.
Sean (Lord Ao)
Age: 32
Marrital Status: Married
Education: Associates in Electronic Engineering
Played D&D since: 1984 with basic red book D&D
Other RPGs: Star Wars (d6), Marvel Super-heroes, Dr. Who, Teenagers From Outer Space, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dragon Storm, Middle Earth, and 4 billion more I've forgotten
Favorite D&D Class: Wizard
Least Favorite D&D Class: Bard
Favorite Movie: Dumb & Dumber
Least Favorite: Tie for Fargo and Left Behind (Tarantino movies suck too :) )
Favorite D&D Character Ever Played: Kri'Lahn human druid/ranger
Favorite D&D Monster: Rust monster
Most Liked Aspect of D&D: Problem solving (not puzzle solving)
Least liked: Psionics
Map
We last left our group after they snuck back to region E after the big fight in room I17. (Later on I was told it was reminiscent of the "game over man!" scene from Aliens.)
The party rested and Dalron and Valden leveled to 7th.
Room I17: The party returns to the scene of the slime. They resume searching the rooms. Eventually they find a key being grasped by a bony drow hand.
Room I19: Three dead drow are setup here back to back almost as if to show them off. The party finds a signet ring on 2 of the drow. One has a symbol on it, but the group has no clue what it means. The other has the symbol of Lolth.
Room I29: Thunderclease's poor Spot skill nailed him on this one. Each corner of the walls of this 4-way intersection had a trap. When the plate on the intersection was hit, the poor person in the middle gets hit by 4 Burning Hands spells for 3d4 each. Thunderclease took under 20 damage and barely noticed. The unfortunate Dalron was standing behind him. He got blasted by 2 of the traps. He easily made his saves and took 0 damage.
Dalron then took to disarming the traps. He removed 1, then another, then had 2 retry for the other 2. Then again. Then he was blasted by the now reset traps. Once again he saved and took no damage. Then he was able to remove them.
Torin seemed rather disappointed.
Room I34: This room was once a laboratory that looked as if it had been hit by a cataclysmic event. The slime in the room, although still there, was less than the more recent rooms. The party didn't like what they saw, so they left before anything bad may happen.
Room I22: This room made the group go "hmmmm". This room was clean and in fact had a dining table with a complete table setting. The setting was worth up to 250gp, but would have weighed 50 lbs., so they left it alone. Further investigation found them nothing.
Room I21: No slime in this room. It was still a mess though. Furniture lay broken and scattered about. In the corner hanging from the wall, were 10 cloaks. Torin investigated, hoping to find something of magic. Dalron followed closely. Zorak cast Detect Magic.
Well the cloakers didn't like that one bit.
Surprise Round: Torin takes a little damage. Dalron takes a lot. The other cloakers spread about the room trying to keep the party separate. All PCs in range saved versus one the cloaker's moan ability. By the end of the round, every PC has at least one cloaker on them except Krieg. It looked real bad for the party.
Round 1: Didn't go that well for the party either. Dalron got in a sneak attack, but missed and then got smacked hard by the cloakers and dropped. Zorak cast Invisibility on himself. Torin took a swing and jumped out of melee. Thunderclease did his usual damage, but these monsters had 40+ hp. The most Thunderclease has ever done was 48, and that was with a critical hit. Valden casts Divine Power on himself. Krieg casts Prayer. Everyone saves versus another cloaker moan attack.
Round 2: Zorak gets off his Haste spell. Thunderclease rips up a couple cloakers. Valden is now almost as potent as Thunderclease in melee, so he hurts a cloaker pretty bad. The party has turned the combat around.
Round 3-4: By the end of round 4, the combat is pretty much over. The last 4 cloakers know this and flee.
Room I28: This room appeared to have once been a prison, but can no longer serve that purpose. Dalron found an area that previously was magically trapped, but that was all he was able to determine.
Room I23: Two rooms in one. The outer room was the same as the rest of rooms, slimy and gross. The inner room had walls made of crystal. When the party investigated the room they found grafitti written in a language they could not understand & 6 broken shackles. They also swore they could hear a fell creature laughing.
Room I24: This room was so full flesh and slime it made the party nervous. It then made them more nervous when they had to make a DC 15 fortitude save. Later those who failed their save would get Cackle fever for about 2 minutes before it was cured. {yawn}.
The party, in a moment of munchkinism (next time they get a disease I'm making secret saves), turn around and choose another direction.
Room I27: Although this room still had some slime, it appeared as though someone had recently scraped away some of the flesh and slime. The party found a secret door to the north that they had to bash at for 5 minutes to get open. Luckily for them, nothing came to investigate.
Room I36: This room appeared to have had been superheated then cooled giving the walls, ceiling, and floors a volcanic/ropy look. When the party investigated the room a voice spoke:
"To pass beyond these doors, you must answer these questions two, the number of the cursed Twins. The first. Who is the Master of this place?"
Krieg went through the scrolls found in room I14, and gave the answer "Mahir".
The response was, "The second. How many of the Master's brood still live within these haunted corridors?"
The party had no clue on this answer. Valden & Krieg discussed what the answer might be. They agreed that 1 or 0 would probably be the correct answer. So Krieg said 0.
Click. Click. Both doors unlocked {sigh - this isn't the first time the party lucked on the right answer!}.
Room I35: Jackpot! Reagents (spell components) were neatly labels and organized on shelves. Zorak has the feat Eschew Material, so find meant nothing to him. The priests were able to find some incense that they intend to use on an Augury spell.
Room I37: This dark, large, and cube shaped room had a pillar in the center. Investigation by the party determined that the pillar in the center was basalt, the darkness came from the pillar via a Deeper Darkness spell, within 1' of the pillar it was very cold, and on the pillar were several icicles no longer than 3".
Over the north door was a riddle written in Undercommon. "I cannot be seen, cannot be felt, cannot be heard, cannot be smelt. I lie behind the stars and beneath the hills. I end life and kill laughter.
Over the south door was a riddle written in Elvish. "I pass before the despised sun, yet make no shadow. What am I?"
Over the east door was presumable another riddle, but the party could not determine the language or the script.
The party went between the north and south doors, rambling off answers in all languages they could speak. The DM could not roll a random encounter for his life during this time.
Eventually Krieg spoke "Darkness" in Undercommon. And the door opened.
Room I38: The door opened to reveal another door. This door had no handle, only a 1" hole where the handle should be.
This being Dalron's domain, he investigated the door, focusing on the hole. The door was a standard, reinforced iron door (read as not easy to break). The hole seemed almost flesh like (enter your predictable joke here - the party sure did).
Dalron could find no mechanisms the hole.
Thunderclease then bashed the door with his sword. The only effect was for the door to swing 1/2" open then close again & the holy damage from the sword was converted to evil damage and sent back to Thunderclease. He tried again with the same results.
Dalron took his {sigh} 10' pole and shoved it into the hole multiple times (you see what I'm dealing with here people?). The end of the pole had blood on it.
(It's not getting any better either.)
Thunderclease once again threw caution to the wind and stuck his finger in the hole. he found that it was (aw man) warm and sticky and only 4" deep.
The party was about to turn around when Valden had one last idea. He grabbed an icicle from the pillar in room I38 and put it into the hole. The icicle made his hand numb, but it also was they key to the door.
The icicle was a poison. The lock was a living lock. The poison knocked out the lock causing the door to open.
The party saw what the living lock was, at least once was. Currently it was a mutilated and deformed excuse for what was once a male drow. The hole was what was once his eye-socket. Thunderclease attempted to put it out of its misery. For 30 seconds the thing stopped breathing (they could tell because its lungs were easily visible), then it healed up and resumed breathing.
This region just keeps getting better and better don't it?
(To anyone who thinks the group's actions and jokes were juveniles, just remember, we're men without women around. If that's not a sufficient answer for you, then you need to lay off the cough syrup.)
The party then investigates the door to the north. When the door was opened nothing bust dust came flying out of the room. Several of the party members were covered in it, but that is all. Thunderclease investigated the room further alone, but found nothing.
Dalron was able to find a secret door.
Room I39: This room appeared to have some lava damage leaving no apparent exits. Dalron searched around and found another cleverly hidden secret door.
Room I41: This room had not been used in awhile, but the party was able to determined that it was once a religious room meant for relaxation or cleansing of one's aura.
Dalron investigated the door to north. He found the door was locked with a very complicated and fragile lock.
Detect Evil found that the local area was not evil, but there was something faintly evil behind the door.
Zorak has a wand of Knock with 33 charges, but refused to use it. He claimed that the celestials placed the lock here for a reason.
After some arguing, the party returns to room I37 to try to solve the riddle to the southern door. They fail and return to rest in region E and ask the celestials some questions about the lock.
They know nothing of the lock.
What will the party do next week?
posted by BlueBlackRed at 4:00 PM
4 Comments:
A bright spot in my day!! Keep up the good work. I read as I play Texas holdem on line. (Often brings luck ;) )
To those who don't know, "the bork" is Joe.
And yes this DM can be bought. But only with BAGS of gummi-savers.
Q:You're kind of mean to your players aren't you?
Aaron: Wait till you read the March 11th blog.
Q:What are your house rules, because your combats don't mesh with the rules all the time?
Aaron: Sean's most notable house rule is movement INTO a threatened square draws and Attack of Opportunity. Fleeing combat also draws an attack, there is no strategic retreat.
Q:How do you handle cheating?
Aaron: This group is fantastic for it's lack of cheating. None of the 'typical' fudged/reroll cheating I have had to put up with in my past games. Even metagame knowlege of monters is suppressed.
There! That pesky rule you all hate so much is gone.
Whiners!
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