Session #48
First let me fill in a little gap from last week; I didn’t give the exact telling of the story correctly: at the end of round 7 there we no nightwalkers alive, but there were two nightwings flapping around. I’m not going back to figure out where exactly I screwed that up. It’s not worth the hassle to fix it. So I patched it with this paragraph.
Ah laziness, how I love thee.
I also forgot to bring in a couple of hordes. So I did a quick patch at the start.
And after some math double-checking, Dale realized that his Divine Sacrifice spell beat the room’s spell resistance.
And we also realized that Krieg’s Invisibility Purge was active and ruining Dariel’s Greater Invisibility.
Ok back to business.
There was no Justin this session. He’s a 21 year old fellow who works at a restaurant as a server (i.e. tips are his life). When he plays with us on Fridays, he loses a good chunk of cash. He was in a little bit of a money crunch, so he chose to work.
Bad choice of nights, but I certainly know what it’s like having no money.
So Thunderclease was played by Brian.
The session started off with our usual hour’s worth of our standard chatting.
We compare the current Bush’s presidency to that of Perot’s.
Conclusion: Perot would have been more fun.
We also discuss about the closing of Aaron and mine’s favorite BBQ restaurant, Famous Dave’s. We were both a little upset about it.
If I don’t mention what someone or something did in the combat, they either stood there and looked pretty, their actions were of minor consequence, or they just moved around and you can judge where they moved to by the pictures.
On that note...
Round 8
Key:
Both unpainted, winged figures = nightwings
Red glass beads = dread wraith cloud
Orange paper = skeleton hordes
Red paper = young adult red dragon skeleton (whose wings work)
Light blue paper = 12-headed pyrohydra skeletons (who can still breath flame).
The dread wraiths continue to swirl around the World Eater, protecting it from the attacks of our heroes. And another 8 of them sacrifice themselves to become another nightwalker.
The Nightwings attempt to dispel the Acid Fog, but both fail yet again.
The World Eater releases another negative energy wave, healing the undead in the room. It also attempts to use a Greater Dispel Magic on Krieg, but it fails to defeat Krieg’s spell resistance of 30.
Krieg shoots the last of his Sunbeams at the World Eater, hitting and doing over 60 damage to it. His acid cloud even does 12 to all in the effect. He then flies up to 30’.
The skeleton hordes (and most other hordes) rip into anything near them. They basically on miss on a natural 1 and they do damage in excess of 30 points. Senmonious find this out.
Thunderclease does some minor damage to the new nightwalker.
Valden flies up to 20’ and casts Blade Barrier right in the path of the heavily weakened dread wraith cloud. Only one dies outright.
Dariel casts Chain Lightning with the main target being the nightwalker and the secondary targets being the World Eater and his wraith cloud. Nothing drops.
Senmonious contemplates getting rid of the World Eater’s Deeper Darkness spell, but opts to keep it around when the group realizes that the 20% concealment is probably protecting them more than impeding them. So instead he flies off the ground and drink a Cure Serious Wounds potion (that healed a little more damage that he took from the skeleton hordes attack of opportunity).
Round 9
The twelve remaining dread wraiths are almost guaranteed death this round, so instead of dying they all sacrifice themselves and become one nightwalker and one nightwing.
One nightwing finally succeeds in dispelling the Acid Fog.
The other flies to, and attacks, Senmonious.
The new nightwalker moves to flank Cleez.
The other nightwalker successfully grabs Thunderclease’s +2 holy greatsword. It wins the grapple check and succeeds in destroying the weapon.
That did not help the party morale.
Dale: "Give me a T. Give me a P. Give me a K. What’s that spell?"
The World Eater, now no longer blocked from flying, flies up 30’ and casts Greater Dispel Magic on Senmonious. Several of his spells are ripped away, including Fly.
Senmonious floats back down to the ground.
Krieg flies down a short distance and uses his spear to attack a nightwalker and hurts it nicely. But it doesn’t drop.
Skeleton hordes (and other hordes) begin pouring into the room. Senmonious is the first to feel their sting.
Cleez, now weaponless, decides to try out his Thundercat claws. Although he does some damage, it’s not enough to make anything more than a dent in a nightwalker’s skin.
The red dragon skeleton already in the room takes to the air.
Valden flies up next to the World Eater and casts Heal on it. He hits it, beats its spell resistance, and it rolls a natural 1 on the save. So it takes 150 damage.
Dariel casts a purified Disintegrate at the World Eater, but fails to beat its 35 spell resistance.
Senmonious takes step back and successfully casts Holy Sword on his longsword.
Round 10
Key:
The half painted griffin = nightwing
Yellow paper = wight horde, ghoul horde, or ghast horde
Treant = nightwalker
Dice = they’re just dice
One nightwing strips Krieg of a few spells with a Greater Dispel Magic. The others attack Valden or maneuver.
One nightwalker destroys Krieg’s spear. The other attacks Cleez, but rolls two natural 1’s.
The World Eater emits another negative energy wave. Valden spots all of the apparent damage from his Heal spell being totally removed.
Everyone in despair: “Oh my god...” or “Oh crap, we’re screwed...”
The World Eater responds with a poison tail attack to Valden, and then flies 30’ straight up. Valden loses 2d6 strength thanks to the poison.
Krieg casts Mass Heal on Senmonious, Dariel, and Valden (which also cures the poison). Some undead are damaged, but none drop.
Aaron: “Welcome to the World’s Largest Graveyard.”
The skeleton hordes totally surround the ground Senmonious. This blenders of bone do almost 90 damage to him. He lives, but only with a single hit point.
Cleez continues to scratch at the nightwalker, doing only scratch damage.
The red dragon skeletons attack Valden and do some minor damage to him. But the minor damage being done to everyone will begin to add up.
During Valden’s action, there is much discussion about what to do next. At some point the divinely made flash-paper scrolls of Imprisonment and Freedom come up, but Valden decides to cast Mass Cure Serious Wounds, centered on Senmonious.
Aaron: “That stupid deity, that (smurf) said we could kill it.”
At some point the gears in Jeff’s head align properly.
Jeff: “We’re being stupid. Take both of the scrolls and burn them.”
(Apparently my intention of making the scrolls out of flash-paper to lead the party into destroying them with fire backfired on me. They thought it made the scrolls very weak and would need more protection.)
Dariel casts a Chain Lightning at the red dragon skeleton in front of him and everything near it. Nothing drops.
Senmonious is able to use Lay on Hands on himself for 90 points. Pretty impressive for a paladin huh?
Sean: “I’m still bummed about Famous Dave’s”
Round 11
Two of the nightwing begin to physically assault the flying members of the party. Their damage is small and although their draining magic abilities work, it doesn’t really matter in the long run.
The third nightwing casts Greater Dispel Magic at Dariel. Several of his spells are stripped from him, and Fly is among them. So he floats back to the ground and is an easy target for the advancing undead hordes.
One of the nightwalkers sees the staff in Dariel’s hand. So it grabs the staff and destroys it.
The other nightwalker pounds on the weaponless Cleez.
No negative energy wave/pulse is emitted by the World Eater this round. It does nothing but fly straight up this round. It is now 120’ up in a 200’ high area of the room.
Krieg flies up and out of combat and retrieves both of the divine flash-paper scrolls from their scroll case.
The skeleton hordes around Senmonious and Dariel rip into them. Sen ends the round with a mere 3 hit points and Dariel is under half.
Cleez does some more minor clawing damage. (Had the night walkers not had a damage resistance of 15, Cleez would probably have done a lot more damage.)
For this one round, a pyrohydra is able to hurt Cleez for a whole 11 damage. But for the rest of the combat, they are worthless.
Both of the red dragon skeletons continue their nickel and dime assault on Valden.
Valden casts a Flame Strike at Krieg. Krieg chooses to fail the save automatically to guarantee that both scrolls are burned.
Dale: “If this doesn’t work, you’ll hear your god snicker.”
A purely bright light fills the room.
Throughout the dungeon every single door opens.
All of the bad effects of the room except the 20 spell resistance are dissipated.
Turning will now work.
The World Eater’s negative energy pulses do not work for the time being (the party is not told this).
Every single thing in the room is hit simultaneously by to Heal spells. This causes up to 300 hundred damage to the undead.
But after the dice stop rolling, only 4 creatures drop (four of the five pyrohydras).
Dariel casts a purified Delayed Blast Fireball to hit several hordes that are near him. All are still there.
Senmonious swings his new holy sword at a horde and nets over 100 points of damage. But it is still there.
Why? Because the power of World Eater is strong. Nearly every undead in the region gained power when it awakened. They each received a bonus of 4HD and were all given maximum hit points.
This meant that a skeleton horde had 1800hp because every individual skeleton went from 1d12 hit points to 5d12 hit points (5x12x30).
Round 12
The two nightwings continue their attacks on Valden and Krieg. The third casts Greater Dispel Magic on Valden. He loses a few spells, but not Fly.
Brian: “Hey nightwing, I still have embarrassing pictures of you back when you were Robin.”
The nightwalkers, having no weapons in range they can destroy, decide to just bash Cleez.
Since round 7 Invistis had been hiding and waiting outside the room in the northern entrance. His plan was simple, wait until the party made a real nuisance of themselves to the World Eater. He would then show up and strike a bargain with the World Eater.
He also wanted revenge on Krieg.
The two scrolls being burned was just what he needed.
He casually walked into the room and cast Maximized Greater Dispel Magic on Thunderclease.
Every single spell on Thunderclease was ripped away. He stood there with no buffs and no longer Thundercat. He was now just a weaponless dwarf with no armor.
(The group objected to the spell being modified with a Maximize Spell feat, but after looking up both the spell and the feat, they accepted it. And I’m betting that is something they will use for later themselves, and then mocked me.)
The party’s situation has gone from bad to worse. They can’t use the miraculous part of Miracle because neither cleric has the spare XP. So they adopt a “Hail Mary” tactic; they believe that if they take down the World Eater the undead will die with it.
Krieg shoots another Sunbeam at the World Eater for 31 damage after saves.
The skeleton hordes rip into Senmonious and Dariel again.
Cleez has not option other than to go on full defense.
The red dragon skeletons continue to hurt Valden.
Valden converts a Miracle into a Sunbeam spell and shoots the World Eater with it and a quickened Searing Light. The Sunbeam breaks through and does 63 damage but the Searing Light does not break through its spell resistance.
Dariel has nowhere to run and hopes this Hail Mary attack will work. He defensively casts a Delayed Blast Fireball (no delay). He does nearly 60 damage to it, but it is still there.
Senmonious furiously swings at one of the skeleton hordes around him. He does another 100+ damage to it. But it does not drop.
Dale: “Four rounds of holy sword left. One round of Senmonious left.”
Round 13
All of the nightwings and red dragon skeletons harass and scratch and Valden and Krieg.
Both nightwalkers continue to punish the weaponless Cleez.
The World Eater does something the party had not expected. It flies up to the ceiling and begins biting huge chunks out of the ceiling. In a mere 6 seconds it has chewed through 5’ of rock and let them crash down to the floor below.
Krieg’s dwarven stonecunning tells him that in 2 hours the World Eater will make it to the surface world.
Krieg shoots a Sunbeam and a quickened Searing Light at the World Eater. Both fail to beat its spell resistance.
The skeleton hordes not involved in combat begin to collect the dropping rocks.
The other skeleton hordes continue to shred apart Senmonious and Dariel. Sen ends this action with -12hp and Dariel with -15.
The combat rounds begin to speed up.
Valden flies directly above Cleez and drops his sword so Cleez can use it. Valden then shoots another failed Sunbeam at the World Eater.
After several checks Cleez catches Valden’s +2 keen flaming greatsword and immediately puts it to use. He drops a nightwalker that had only 1hp, cleaves into the nearby ghoul horde, and then 5’ steps to attack the other nightwalker and takes a small chunk out of it.
Round 14
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons continue to plague Krieg and Valden.
The nightwalker attempts to grab the new weapon from Cleez but rolls a natural 1.
The World Eater burrows another 5’. It is now 10’ in.
Krieg’s Sunbeam hits and the World Eater fails its save for another 63 damage.
The last of the skeleton hordes arrive. With no new targets they can get to, they set about collecting more fallen rocks and begin piling them up just outside of the blade barrier. Some of them trample over Sen and Dariel.
Valden: another round, another failed Sunbeam.
Thunderclease attacks several times and misses with every single one.
Real time is now 11pm.
Dale: “We didn’t think we’d make it this long.”
Round 15
The nightwings and dragon skeletons continue their previous actions.
From the mass of the World Eater a black ray shoots down and hits Invistis.
Their deal complete, the lich has received some of the World Eater’s power. (Their deal was discussed telepathically – yeah that’s the ticket.)
Invistis’s eyes change from pinpricks of red light to bright points of emerald blue light.
He then casts a quickened Magic Missile at Krieg and does 15 damage and then casts Enervation at Cleez, giving Cleez 4 negative levels.
Krieg shoots another Sunbeam and does 31 damage.
Valden shoots another Sunbeam and once again fails to penetrate its spell resistance.
Cleez only hit with one attack and the walker is still standing.
Round 16
Because we didn’t keep exact track of when the round per level spells were cast, all of Dariel’s round per level spells expire at this point (otherwise they would be expiring before now – we rarely get far enough in combat to have to deal with it).
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons (snore).
The nightwalker grabs Cleez’s borrowed weapon and destroys it.
The World Eater is 20’ in.
Krieg succeeds yet again with his Sunbeam.
Valden yet again does not succeed with his last Sunbeam.
Cleez returns to full defense.
Round 17
We’ve determined that the spell Sublime Revelry is way overpowered, but in the current situation we’re ok with that.
Jeff: “Our corpses will be resisting damage quite nicely.”
The World Eater is now 25’ in.
Krieg hits the World Eater yet again with his very last Sunbeam. In spite of the party’s vocal hopes and prayers, the World Eater still lives.
Dale: “So Tyr, you pansy-ass, who are you going to get to kill your dragon now?”
Valden had been so concerned with their “Hail Mary – kill the World Eater” offensive, that he had not healed himself.
He only had 5hp remaining, so he defensively casts Heal on himself.
Unfortunately Invistis had been holding action and waiting to dispel a spell with a Greater Dispel Magic.
Invistis succeeds. Valden is left in a very bad situation.
As an afterthought, Valden casts a quickened Silence at Invistis.
But Invistis had been doubly prepared for that.
No self-respecting lich would let himself be neutered with a level 2 clerical spell. He had long ago used a Wish to render himself immune to silence effects and had a Contingency spell for Minor Globe of Invulnerability.
The Silence spell did nothing.
Cleez is still on full defense.
Round 18
All of Valden’s and Krieg’s round per level spells expire.
Valden dies when his Righteous Might spell expires and he loses the 4 bonus points of constitution, leaving him with -31hp.
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons now only have one flying target.
The World Eater is now 30’ in.
Dale: “Ooh this isn’t looking good.”
Jeff: (everyone laughs) “Where have you been the last 3 hours?”
Krieg steps 5’ next to Thunderclease and casts Prismatic Sphere on the defensive.
The nightwalker drops from the effects, and a few bits of hordes are shredded by it as well.
Invistis would have dispelled it had he not used his action screwing over Valden.
Invistis flies up and moves closer to combat.
Cleez drinks a healing potion.
The last of monsters in the region, two zombie hordes show up.
Round 19
(The rounds are moving really fast now.)
The World Eater is now 35’ in.
Krieg converts a spell to heal himself.
Invistis casts Cone of Cold on the Prismatic Sphere and removes the red shell.
Cleez reaches into Krieg’s pack and grabs a +3 keen axe of throwing.
Round 20
The World Eater is now 40’ in.
Krieg converts a healing spell on Cleez.
Invistis wants revenge on Krieg bad. He even uses a Limited Wish spell to cast Gust of Wind to remove the orange shell.
Round 21
The World Eater is now 45’ in.
Krieg casts Death Ward on Cleez.
Invistis casts Disintegrate to remove the yellow shell.
Round 22
The World Eater is now 50’ in.
Aaron: “The Prismatic Sphere was just to be annoying. Um, I invoke the 2E divine intervention rule.”
No such invocation was answered.
Campaign
Time of death 11:55pm
January 2006
Friday the 13th
Soon I will add a bit of a story for what happened after round 22.
What? The campaign was over, it was almost midnight, and I think we were all ready to move on.
We had a good time and a good run with this dungeon.
Ah laziness, how I love thee.
I also forgot to bring in a couple of hordes. So I did a quick patch at the start.
And after some math double-checking, Dale realized that his Divine Sacrifice spell beat the room’s spell resistance.
And we also realized that Krieg’s Invisibility Purge was active and ruining Dariel’s Greater Invisibility.
Ok back to business.
There was no Justin this session. He’s a 21 year old fellow who works at a restaurant as a server (i.e. tips are his life). When he plays with us on Fridays, he loses a good chunk of cash. He was in a little bit of a money crunch, so he chose to work.
Bad choice of nights, but I certainly know what it’s like having no money.
So Thunderclease was played by Brian.
The session started off with our usual hour’s worth of our standard chatting.
We compare the current Bush’s presidency to that of Perot’s.
Conclusion: Perot would have been more fun.
We also discuss about the closing of Aaron and mine’s favorite BBQ restaurant, Famous Dave’s. We were both a little upset about it.
If I don’t mention what someone or something did in the combat, they either stood there and looked pretty, their actions were of minor consequence, or they just moved around and you can judge where they moved to by the pictures.
On that note...
Round 8
Key:
Both unpainted, winged figures = nightwings
Red glass beads = dread wraith cloud
Orange paper = skeleton hordes
Red paper = young adult red dragon skeleton (whose wings work)
Light blue paper = 12-headed pyrohydra skeletons (who can still breath flame).
The dread wraiths continue to swirl around the World Eater, protecting it from the attacks of our heroes. And another 8 of them sacrifice themselves to become another nightwalker.
The Nightwings attempt to dispel the Acid Fog, but both fail yet again.
The World Eater releases another negative energy wave, healing the undead in the room. It also attempts to use a Greater Dispel Magic on Krieg, but it fails to defeat Krieg’s spell resistance of 30.
Krieg shoots the last of his Sunbeams at the World Eater, hitting and doing over 60 damage to it. His acid cloud even does 12 to all in the effect. He then flies up to 30’.
The skeleton hordes (and most other hordes) rip into anything near them. They basically on miss on a natural 1 and they do damage in excess of 30 points. Senmonious find this out.
Thunderclease does some minor damage to the new nightwalker.
Valden flies up to 20’ and casts Blade Barrier right in the path of the heavily weakened dread wraith cloud. Only one dies outright.
Dariel casts Chain Lightning with the main target being the nightwalker and the secondary targets being the World Eater and his wraith cloud. Nothing drops.
Senmonious contemplates getting rid of the World Eater’s Deeper Darkness spell, but opts to keep it around when the group realizes that the 20% concealment is probably protecting them more than impeding them. So instead he flies off the ground and drink a Cure Serious Wounds potion (that healed a little more damage that he took from the skeleton hordes attack of opportunity).
Round 9
The twelve remaining dread wraiths are almost guaranteed death this round, so instead of dying they all sacrifice themselves and become one nightwalker and one nightwing.
One nightwing finally succeeds in dispelling the Acid Fog.
The other flies to, and attacks, Senmonious.
The new nightwalker moves to flank Cleez.
The other nightwalker successfully grabs Thunderclease’s +2 holy greatsword. It wins the grapple check and succeeds in destroying the weapon.
That did not help the party morale.
Dale: "Give me a T. Give me a P. Give me a K. What’s that spell?"
The World Eater, now no longer blocked from flying, flies up 30’ and casts Greater Dispel Magic on Senmonious. Several of his spells are ripped away, including Fly.
Senmonious floats back down to the ground.
Krieg flies down a short distance and uses his spear to attack a nightwalker and hurts it nicely. But it doesn’t drop.
Skeleton hordes (and other hordes) begin pouring into the room. Senmonious is the first to feel their sting.
Cleez, now weaponless, decides to try out his Thundercat claws. Although he does some damage, it’s not enough to make anything more than a dent in a nightwalker’s skin.
The red dragon skeleton already in the room takes to the air.
Valden flies up next to the World Eater and casts Heal on it. He hits it, beats its spell resistance, and it rolls a natural 1 on the save. So it takes 150 damage.
Dariel casts a purified Disintegrate at the World Eater, but fails to beat its 35 spell resistance.
Senmonious takes step back and successfully casts Holy Sword on his longsword.
Round 10
Key:
The half painted griffin = nightwing
Yellow paper = wight horde, ghoul horde, or ghast horde
Treant = nightwalker
Dice = they’re just dice
One nightwing strips Krieg of a few spells with a Greater Dispel Magic. The others attack Valden or maneuver.
One nightwalker destroys Krieg’s spear. The other attacks Cleez, but rolls two natural 1’s.
The World Eater emits another negative energy wave. Valden spots all of the apparent damage from his Heal spell being totally removed.
Everyone in despair: “Oh my god...” or “Oh crap, we’re screwed...”
The World Eater responds with a poison tail attack to Valden, and then flies 30’ straight up. Valden loses 2d6 strength thanks to the poison.
Krieg casts Mass Heal on Senmonious, Dariel, and Valden (which also cures the poison). Some undead are damaged, but none drop.
Aaron: “Welcome to the World’s Largest Graveyard.”
The skeleton hordes totally surround the ground Senmonious. This blenders of bone do almost 90 damage to him. He lives, but only with a single hit point.
Cleez continues to scratch at the nightwalker, doing only scratch damage.
The red dragon skeletons attack Valden and do some minor damage to him. But the minor damage being done to everyone will begin to add up.
During Valden’s action, there is much discussion about what to do next. At some point the divinely made flash-paper scrolls of Imprisonment and Freedom come up, but Valden decides to cast Mass Cure Serious Wounds, centered on Senmonious.
Aaron: “That stupid deity, that (smurf) said we could kill it.”
At some point the gears in Jeff’s head align properly.
Jeff: “We’re being stupid. Take both of the scrolls and burn them.”
(Apparently my intention of making the scrolls out of flash-paper to lead the party into destroying them with fire backfired on me. They thought it made the scrolls very weak and would need more protection.)
Dariel casts a Chain Lightning at the red dragon skeleton in front of him and everything near it. Nothing drops.
Senmonious is able to use Lay on Hands on himself for 90 points. Pretty impressive for a paladin huh?
Sean: “I’m still bummed about Famous Dave’s”
Round 11
Two of the nightwing begin to physically assault the flying members of the party. Their damage is small and although their draining magic abilities work, it doesn’t really matter in the long run.
The third nightwing casts Greater Dispel Magic at Dariel. Several of his spells are stripped from him, and Fly is among them. So he floats back to the ground and is an easy target for the advancing undead hordes.
One of the nightwalkers sees the staff in Dariel’s hand. So it grabs the staff and destroys it.
The other nightwalker pounds on the weaponless Cleez.
No negative energy wave/pulse is emitted by the World Eater this round. It does nothing but fly straight up this round. It is now 120’ up in a 200’ high area of the room.
Krieg flies up and out of combat and retrieves both of the divine flash-paper scrolls from their scroll case.
The skeleton hordes around Senmonious and Dariel rip into them. Sen ends the round with a mere 3 hit points and Dariel is under half.
Cleez does some more minor clawing damage. (Had the night walkers not had a damage resistance of 15, Cleez would probably have done a lot more damage.)
For this one round, a pyrohydra is able to hurt Cleez for a whole 11 damage. But for the rest of the combat, they are worthless.
Both of the red dragon skeletons continue their nickel and dime assault on Valden.
Valden casts a Flame Strike at Krieg. Krieg chooses to fail the save automatically to guarantee that both scrolls are burned.
Dale: “If this doesn’t work, you’ll hear your god snicker.”
A purely bright light fills the room.
Throughout the dungeon every single door opens.
All of the bad effects of the room except the 20 spell resistance are dissipated.
Turning will now work.
The World Eater’s negative energy pulses do not work for the time being (the party is not told this).
Every single thing in the room is hit simultaneously by to Heal spells. This causes up to 300 hundred damage to the undead.
But after the dice stop rolling, only 4 creatures drop (four of the five pyrohydras).
Dariel casts a purified Delayed Blast Fireball to hit several hordes that are near him. All are still there.
Senmonious swings his new holy sword at a horde and nets over 100 points of damage. But it is still there.
Why? Because the power of World Eater is strong. Nearly every undead in the region gained power when it awakened. They each received a bonus of 4HD and were all given maximum hit points.
This meant that a skeleton horde had 1800hp because every individual skeleton went from 1d12 hit points to 5d12 hit points (5x12x30).
Round 12
The two nightwings continue their attacks on Valden and Krieg. The third casts Greater Dispel Magic on Valden. He loses a few spells, but not Fly.
Brian: “Hey nightwing, I still have embarrassing pictures of you back when you were Robin.”
The nightwalkers, having no weapons in range they can destroy, decide to just bash Cleez.
Since round 7 Invistis had been hiding and waiting outside the room in the northern entrance. His plan was simple, wait until the party made a real nuisance of themselves to the World Eater. He would then show up and strike a bargain with the World Eater.
He also wanted revenge on Krieg.
The two scrolls being burned was just what he needed.
He casually walked into the room and cast Maximized Greater Dispel Magic on Thunderclease.
Every single spell on Thunderclease was ripped away. He stood there with no buffs and no longer Thundercat. He was now just a weaponless dwarf with no armor.
(The group objected to the spell being modified with a Maximize Spell feat, but after looking up both the spell and the feat, they accepted it. And I’m betting that is something they will use for later themselves, and then mocked me.)
The party’s situation has gone from bad to worse. They can’t use the miraculous part of Miracle because neither cleric has the spare XP. So they adopt a “Hail Mary” tactic; they believe that if they take down the World Eater the undead will die with it.
Krieg shoots another Sunbeam at the World Eater for 31 damage after saves.
The skeleton hordes rip into Senmonious and Dariel again.
Cleez has not option other than to go on full defense.
The red dragon skeletons continue to hurt Valden.
Valden converts a Miracle into a Sunbeam spell and shoots the World Eater with it and a quickened Searing Light. The Sunbeam breaks through and does 63 damage but the Searing Light does not break through its spell resistance.
Dariel has nowhere to run and hopes this Hail Mary attack will work. He defensively casts a Delayed Blast Fireball (no delay). He does nearly 60 damage to it, but it is still there.
Senmonious furiously swings at one of the skeleton hordes around him. He does another 100+ damage to it. But it does not drop.
Dale: “Four rounds of holy sword left. One round of Senmonious left.”
Round 13
All of the nightwings and red dragon skeletons harass and scratch and Valden and Krieg.
Both nightwalkers continue to punish the weaponless Cleez.
The World Eater does something the party had not expected. It flies up to the ceiling and begins biting huge chunks out of the ceiling. In a mere 6 seconds it has chewed through 5’ of rock and let them crash down to the floor below.
Krieg’s dwarven stonecunning tells him that in 2 hours the World Eater will make it to the surface world.
Krieg shoots a Sunbeam and a quickened Searing Light at the World Eater. Both fail to beat its spell resistance.
The skeleton hordes not involved in combat begin to collect the dropping rocks.
The other skeleton hordes continue to shred apart Senmonious and Dariel. Sen ends this action with -12hp and Dariel with -15.
The combat rounds begin to speed up.
Valden flies directly above Cleez and drops his sword so Cleez can use it. Valden then shoots another failed Sunbeam at the World Eater.
After several checks Cleez catches Valden’s +2 keen flaming greatsword and immediately puts it to use. He drops a nightwalker that had only 1hp, cleaves into the nearby ghoul horde, and then 5’ steps to attack the other nightwalker and takes a small chunk out of it.
Round 14
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons continue to plague Krieg and Valden.
The nightwalker attempts to grab the new weapon from Cleez but rolls a natural 1.
The World Eater burrows another 5’. It is now 10’ in.
Krieg’s Sunbeam hits and the World Eater fails its save for another 63 damage.
The last of the skeleton hordes arrive. With no new targets they can get to, they set about collecting more fallen rocks and begin piling them up just outside of the blade barrier. Some of them trample over Sen and Dariel.
Valden: another round, another failed Sunbeam.
Thunderclease attacks several times and misses with every single one.
Real time is now 11pm.
Dale: “We didn’t think we’d make it this long.”
Round 15
The nightwings and dragon skeletons continue their previous actions.
From the mass of the World Eater a black ray shoots down and hits Invistis.
Their deal complete, the lich has received some of the World Eater’s power. (Their deal was discussed telepathically – yeah that’s the ticket.)
Invistis’s eyes change from pinpricks of red light to bright points of emerald blue light.
He then casts a quickened Magic Missile at Krieg and does 15 damage and then casts Enervation at Cleez, giving Cleez 4 negative levels.
Krieg shoots another Sunbeam and does 31 damage.
Valden shoots another Sunbeam and once again fails to penetrate its spell resistance.
Cleez only hit with one attack and the walker is still standing.
Round 16
Because we didn’t keep exact track of when the round per level spells were cast, all of Dariel’s round per level spells expire at this point (otherwise they would be expiring before now – we rarely get far enough in combat to have to deal with it).
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons (snore).
The nightwalker grabs Cleez’s borrowed weapon and destroys it.
The World Eater is 20’ in.
Krieg succeeds yet again with his Sunbeam.
Valden yet again does not succeed with his last Sunbeam.
Cleez returns to full defense.
Round 17
We’ve determined that the spell Sublime Revelry is way overpowered, but in the current situation we’re ok with that.
Jeff: “Our corpses will be resisting damage quite nicely.”
The World Eater is now 25’ in.
Krieg hits the World Eater yet again with his very last Sunbeam. In spite of the party’s vocal hopes and prayers, the World Eater still lives.
Dale: “So Tyr, you pansy-ass, who are you going to get to kill your dragon now?”
Valden had been so concerned with their “Hail Mary – kill the World Eater” offensive, that he had not healed himself.
He only had 5hp remaining, so he defensively casts Heal on himself.
Unfortunately Invistis had been holding action and waiting to dispel a spell with a Greater Dispel Magic.
Invistis succeeds. Valden is left in a very bad situation.
As an afterthought, Valden casts a quickened Silence at Invistis.
But Invistis had been doubly prepared for that.
No self-respecting lich would let himself be neutered with a level 2 clerical spell. He had long ago used a Wish to render himself immune to silence effects and had a Contingency spell for Minor Globe of Invulnerability.
The Silence spell did nothing.
Cleez is still on full defense.
Round 18
All of Valden’s and Krieg’s round per level spells expire.
Valden dies when his Righteous Might spell expires and he loses the 4 bonus points of constitution, leaving him with -31hp.
The nightwings and red dragon skeletons now only have one flying target.
The World Eater is now 30’ in.
Dale: “Ooh this isn’t looking good.”
Jeff: (everyone laughs) “Where have you been the last 3 hours?”
Krieg steps 5’ next to Thunderclease and casts Prismatic Sphere on the defensive.
The nightwalker drops from the effects, and a few bits of hordes are shredded by it as well.
Invistis would have dispelled it had he not used his action screwing over Valden.
Invistis flies up and moves closer to combat.
Cleez drinks a healing potion.
The last of monsters in the region, two zombie hordes show up.
Round 19
(The rounds are moving really fast now.)
The World Eater is now 35’ in.
Krieg converts a spell to heal himself.
Invistis casts Cone of Cold on the Prismatic Sphere and removes the red shell.
Cleez reaches into Krieg’s pack and grabs a +3 keen axe of throwing.
Round 20
The World Eater is now 40’ in.
Krieg converts a healing spell on Cleez.
Invistis wants revenge on Krieg bad. He even uses a Limited Wish spell to cast Gust of Wind to remove the orange shell.
Round 21
The World Eater is now 45’ in.
Krieg casts Death Ward on Cleez.
Invistis casts Disintegrate to remove the yellow shell.
Round 22
The World Eater is now 50’ in.
Aaron: “The Prismatic Sphere was just to be annoying. Um, I invoke the 2E divine intervention rule.”
No such invocation was answered.
Campaign
Time of death 11:55pm
January 2006
Friday the 13th
Soon I will add a bit of a story for what happened after round 22.
What? The campaign was over, it was almost midnight, and I think we were all ready to move on.
We had a good time and a good run with this dungeon.
posted by BlueBlackRed at 10:46 PM
8 Comments:
Man that bums me out, first "Famous Daves" and now this?
That was quite a run, and I was really impressed with many of the things that your players were able to accomplish.
So was your group bummed out about the TPK, or are they ready to move on to some other campaign as well?
Finally, do you think that you will have anything to do with this dungeon again? Possibly a different path through the dungeon after you guys take a break and experience something else first?
My consolations. I really enjoyed reading your blog and hope you guys had a good run through.
Good luck with your next game
Yeah...I'm really going to miss Famous Dave's. The next nearest one is in Indiana.
Our group was a little bummed, but I think I am more than they are. We had a fun ride, but it was time for it to end. It just didn't end how I thought it would.
I doubt any of us will want to do the WLD again. I heard that someone is converting it to Basic D&D. That might be interesting to check out.
Thank you for your consolations.
Dale will be running our next campign, and there will finally be role-playing again.
Oh how I miss above-ground role-playing.
*Keanu Reaves voice*: Whoa.
I see you just looked at these comments only moments ago. I hope you check them again. Believe you me, I didn't expect the battle to go anything like this either; Thundercat seemed almost unstoppable.
That Nightwalker really turned the tide, though.
Please accept my condolences, and my congratulations on getting so far in the World's Largest Dungeon.
A few more questions that I forgot to ask, How close were they to bringing down the world eater, and did you think they had a chance, or at what point did you see the writing on the wall as to what was going to happen?
One of this party's biggest weaknesses was relying heavily upon Thunderclease.
And Thunderclease had a weakness of relying on his sword.
I'll write more about all that later though.
There are a lot of "What if's" for that session.
And of the World Eater's hit points remaing, he was just under 200 remaining from 700.
Once again a "What if", but had they used the scrolls a little bit sooner, things may have been radically different.
I really enjoyed reading the blog. It gave me some good ideas for when i run it for my group. Is there gonna be a blog for your next game as well?
Thanks!
I hope your game goes as well as ours did.
As for another blog, I'm still not sure.
I'm a bit torn of whether I should start a new blog or continue on this one.
But even if I did do a continuing gaming blog, it would not be anywhere near as in depth as the WLD entries. That took a lot of time and effort.
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