Session #29

Well this session was about standard.

Jeff was unable to attend because his work went him on another training trip. This time to Las Vegas. Poor guy.

Joe cancelled at the last minute. He'll probably deny it, but I think it's because he's got a ladyfriend. I guess we'll find out next session.

Map

We last left the heroes as they rested up in their adopted bedroom.
During that time 3 of the group leveled.

Krieg becomes a level 12 cleric.
Thunderclease reaches level 11 (2 ftr/9 brb).
Valden becomes a level 11 cleric.

Every group should have 2 clerics (in addition to covering the other 3 base classes of course).

Well the group has been trying to find clues about both Tyrus (the big evil dragon) and the mysterious lady that keeps appearing and begging for their help, but so far they're coming up short on answers.

In come the use of Augury & Divination spells. The DM has made it more than clear to the party that these kinds of spells should be used sparingly, but he considered this a legitimate use for it.

Krieg first cast Divination.
"Where can we find the 'Dark One'?"
"Five switches you must seek for the Dark One to be free."

Much discussion followed on what this meant. The consensus was that the switch they found on the statue of lady in distress is probably the one that the spell results are referring to.

Valden cast Augury.
"Will freeing the Dark One harm the garrison?"
"Weal...Woe...Weal...Woe."

That answer didn't give them the warm fuzzies.

So they set about finding the 4 remaining switches.

First they return to...

Room J55 (not on map): The last time the party was here, it was the first time they saw the long-haired lady. There was also a statue of her here in an alcove, and an empty alcove on the opposite side of the room.

A thorough search of the statue came up with no switch. But the party decided to give moving the statue a shot.

It took over 15 minutes to slowly push the heavy statue into the other alcove.

Once the finished, the steam in the room showed another illusion. But this time not of the long-haired lady. It showed an azer, happily toiling away in a mine, trying to get some gem out of the stone. Then the illusion focused on a small sack at the azer's feet. Exposed from the sack was a shiny sphere.

Then the scene changed to one of a stone pair of female hands, outstretched to hold something spherical.

(If that's not an obvious enough hint, I don't know what is.)

So now the party has to find an azer with a shiny orb.

Room J83 (both): Broken angel statues.

Room J42: Heart attack for the party. They open the door to this room and find thousands of gems ranging in value from 50gp to 250gp.

The party smells a trap, so Torin searches the area without touching a gem. He comes up with nothing, so Zorak casts Detect Magic.

Every single gem radiates magic. An easily made spellcraft check later and Zorak determines that each gem has an Alarm spell cast on it.

The party realizes that these gems belong to the azers. And since they don't want to make enemies of the azers, the party leaves.

Room J41: The party didn't actually get to see the inside of this room. Torin heard some voices on the other side of the door. Long story short, the 3 azers in the room barricaded themselves and told the party to scram.

Room J39: The party intended to talk to the azers mining here in the hopes finding the shiny orb. They were able to do that and better.

When they entered the room this room all of the previous times, the azers gave them a less than warm reception. But since the party killed all but 2 of the fire giants and aided in the release of their own kind, the azers considered them friends (kind of).

After some friendly talking, the party was able to get some information about the azer's leader Terr'kaal, Ter'kaal's god (some big mean looking dragon), and Torin traded his Ring of Climbing for the mithril orb the party saw in the vision. And since the azers had no need of gold, they gave the party pver 4000gp that was left over from the fire giant queen's treasure.

With a thanks, the party moved on.

They tried to get near the river of lava nearby, hoping to scout out that area. But they had another run in with the magma and steam mephits. The party offered the mephits their new gold, but the mephits would hear nothing of a metal as a reward for murder.

Room J37: Thorough searching practices found the secret door to this room.

This room seemed very familiar to the group. Four statues, 2 dragons (1 attacking and 1 sleeping) and 2 lions (also 1 attacking and 1 sleeping), were set up in this room. All of the statues were on swivels.

The beautiful, long-haired lady reappeared and said:
"I'm here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum."

No, wait. That's not right.

Oh here it is.
"Help me great heroes! Help me escape this terrible curse! Only you can save me from the dragon by turning the lion's wrath on its slumber."

Stifling a yawn, the party solved the puzzle and they heard a song to west, like before. They also heard a click in the door to the south.

Room J38: (Ignore the 4 left J38 rooms) The party found in this room another statue of the lady they've been trying to save.

Knowing to look for a switch, Torin found it easily. But he decided to not touch it because of what happened Krieg when he touched the last statue.

So it was decided that Thunderclease would be the one to flip the switch.

Instead of a Harm spell, a Dictum spell was triggered. Although it messed with the party, the end result was for the party to spend a few minutes recovering.

Room J36: The third and final room of fire statues. The party did some quick searching of this room, found nothing, and moved on.

Room J76 (all): Some statues, but not of angels, an ogre.

Room J45: The party new there was something in this area, the map screamed it, and the azers told them that Terr'kaal in the area.

But the party was not quite expecting what happened. They had to enter this large room to see what was going on.

Twenty azers were kneeling and chanting before a statue of a red dragon. Then ogre dressed in ceremonial robes, and 2 azers holding cauldrons stepped from behind the dragon statue.
One cauldron was full boiling magma, the other full of gems.
The ogre began chanting and shoved a hand into each cauldron.

Then the party was spotted.

Round 1: Standard early maneuvering and buffing. The ogre and his 2 azer aides remained where they were. Several of the azers charged the party (and these weren't the standard chump azers either).
The party split around the column; Torin & Valden to the north, and Krieg, Cleez, & Sen to the east.
Zorak cast Haste and hung back.

Round 2: Zorak was able to maneuver and get a Cone of Cold that hit the majority of the enemy. That alone took out over half of the azer warriors and hurt the ogre and his aides.
Thunderclease and Senmonious charged the ogre, both doing some decent damage.
Valden & Torin were blocked in by a trio of azers, but were able to double team them one at a time.
Krieg cast Prayer and was able to include most everyone on the battlefield.
The ogre and his aides seemed oblivious to what was happening around them and to them. Then the ogre changed into huge fire elemental.
The azer warriors cut into Valden pretty good, including a crit with a greataxe.
Krieg was suddenly left all alone with 3 azer warriors. They brought him down to 30% of his hp.

Round 3: Zorak cast Greater Invisibility on himself.
Torin and Valden brought down their first azer.
Thunderclease and Sen wailed into the fire elemental, doing massive amounts of damage together.
Krieg casts Heal on the defensive and botches the roll, ruining the spell.
The azers deal much less this round. But Krieg is down to single-digit hp.
The once-ogre fire elemental moves away into the northwest corner of the room.

Round 4: Zorak maneuvers himself once again to do some nasty damage with a Cone of Cold.
Torin and Valden are able severely hurt another azer.
Thunderclease chases after the fire elemental.
Senmonious rushes to the aid of Krieg and brings one down.
Krieg steps back and casts Cure Critical Wounds on himself.
The azers chase after Krieg, but are unable to hit him this time.
The fire elemental slams Thunderclease a couple of times, but the damage is laughable by comparison to the damage it has taken.

Round 5: Another Cone of Cold from Zorak and the elemental explodes into a fireball. Then it turns into a flaming cloud and floats up near the ceiling.
Krieg attempts to blast the cloud with a Flame Strike, but to no effect.

The rest of the azers are cleaned up handily, but the flaming cloud moves at incredible speed out of the room and out of sight.

The party immediately sets out to loot and heal.
Their biggest find yet is over 650 gems ranging from 50gp to 250gp.

Then 5 minutes later the entirety of region J is wracked by an inferno of fire, dealing 15d6 damage of fire to everything and everyone (no save).

Luckily for the party, they had plenty of fire protection.

Afterwards the party went through a secret door they found that luckily led them back to their home.
For some reason the party felt it to be bad idea to face the other, friendly azers after fighting the others.

The party returned home and rested.
And then the rest of the party leveled.
Zorak is now a level 12 sorcerer (now armed with Disintegrate).
Torin added a level of...Brian will let us know next week.
Senmonious is now a level 10 paladin.

Is region J almost done?
We'll see.
(Man I hope so.)