Black Robes of Treachery
Jul. 23rd, 2004 12:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
terryclothTonight we fought our way one room deeper into the back entrance to Frost's lair. Past an old business associate, who came back to do more business with us after we killed him.
The party lined up before the stone wall hidden behind the illusionary wall, with Mike about to disintegrate it, when Murphy said 'Stop! An alarm spell just went off, we'd better prepare for combat.' So they did, Mike in particular taking nearly a minute to finish casting various spells on himself, Murphy, Kijj, Tetsuyo, and Lini (Sonnet, Sawyer, and Morgan were lingering a little too far behind to join in the combat immediately, and the party didn't think they had time to wait) [ie, they showed up for the game late].
THEN he disintegrated the wall.
Behind it was Melkor, the black robe to whom they'd sold various elf-blood potions and monster eggs, flanked by two huge admantium golems, glowing with a starmantle, surrounded by mirror images, and quite obviously displaced. He lowered his staff, spoke a word, and triggered three symbols, which instantly killed Tetsuyo and drove Mike and Lini insane.
Lini gibbered, Mike fled in confused terror, Kijj dimension-doored to close with the mage, and Murphy fired off a ray from his precast prismatic eye and another spell, neither of which had much effect. Melkor shot back a prismatic spray, turning Murphy to stone. The golems -- shield guardians -- turned to beat on Kijj, but he was blinky and mirror imaged and all, and they didn't manage to actually hurt him.
But then, Kijj's attacks against Melkor were similarly ineffective, the evil mage's starmantle and stoneskin reducing the few that hit to the point where the remaining damage -- all of which was transferred to the shield guardians -- was barely noticeable, and quickly healed.
All might have been lost if Sonnet and Morgan hadn't shown up. Sonnet and Sawyer raced headlong into the glyphs, and were both driven insane, and Sawyer was also stunned. Morgan stayed back around the corner, instead, and used the Orb of Good he'd retrieved from Sonnet to heal Lini, who then healed Mike (after Mike prismatic-sprayed her), who healed Sonnet and Murphy while Morgan teleported Lini to heal Kijj, who by that point had taken down both guardians, but was in terrible shape, having taken the full brunt of all the enemies' attacks for several rounds (and would have been dust thrice over if not for a series of lucky saves and blinks).
Sonnet complained bitterly that Lini hadn't taken the time to heal Sawyer, but fired off a series of silence spells to make things harder for the wizard, ending up with one on Kijj. Since damaging the mage was so difficult, Kijj grappled him instead. And missed. But got him on the second try, after Mike put up a wall of stone to block his passage, and Murphy dimensional anchored him.
All this time, Murphy and Melkor had had Mordenkainen's Swords slashing at each other, but Murphy was a LOT easier to hit in melee, and went down under the assault. Lini went back to heal him before he was killed (the swords wouldn't change targets on their own just because the guy they were slashing went down), leaving Kijj and Morgan to try to find some way to damage the grappled mage, while Mike counterspelled his silent, still spells (using Disjunct) and Sonnet made things worse for everyone by repeatedly using her rod of wonder (doing 50 damage to Kijj with a fireball and lightning bolt, and not a single point to Melkor).
Then the Guardians got back up, having healed the 100+ points of overkill Kijj had done to each of them some time before. And went back down again, to a fireball and some additional damage done to the mage by Morgan's rod of force. Then got back up. And went down again thanks to Murphy's chain lightning. And got back up. And went back down again as Kijj (who'd switched to his admantium battleaxe from his natural weapons) FINALLY got the lucky hit he needed with a stoneskin-piercing weapon, and did the last 8 damage needed to drop the mage, finishing him with some semi-draconic teeth to the throat.
Then got back up... but didn't attack. Which was odd, but (so the party thought) fortunate, because now they had the earrings that controlled them, and could use them as their OWN guardians.
There was no sign of Melkor's spellbook anywhere, so they had Lini cast Speak With Dead, expecting it to fail. Somewhat to their surprise, the ghostly form of Melkor appeared, and started demanding that they give him back his stuff.
Although Melkor's 'ghost' refused to confirm it, Murphy suspected that the mage was not actually dead, instead having used a Clone to revive himself instantly. Eventually, in response to repeated threats to go warn Frost of their mission (ensuring its failure), they agreed to give the golems back to him after the mission was over -- until then, they'd be hostages to his good behavior. In return, Melkor agreed to a truce with them, and to provide discounted magical item creation services on their behalf, up to some small limit.
There were still a few days -- well, okay, weeks -- left until it was time to actually invade the lair, but there was nothing left to do but wait -- according to Melkor's notes the lair was another mile and a half down the corridor.
last week | next week
Melkor had some really quite ridiculously valuable stuff on his body, including a ring of protection +5 and freedom of movement, which should have let him escape the grapple. Which wouldn't have actually helped him much, since he was always hedged in in a silenced area and surrounded by enemies anyway, with Mike countering his spells. Actually, there was one spell he wanted to cast but couldn't, but if he'd been casting with components Mike wouldn't have missed ANY of his spellcraft checks.
The party lined up before the stone wall hidden behind the illusionary wall, with Mike about to disintegrate it, when Murphy said 'Stop! An alarm spell just went off, we'd better prepare for combat.' So they did, Mike in particular taking nearly a minute to finish casting various spells on himself, Murphy, Kijj, Tetsuyo, and Lini (Sonnet, Sawyer, and Morgan were lingering a little too far behind to join in the combat immediately, and the party didn't think they had time to wait) [ie, they showed up for the game late].
THEN he disintegrated the wall.
Behind it was Melkor, the black robe to whom they'd sold various elf-blood potions and monster eggs, flanked by two huge admantium golems, glowing with a starmantle, surrounded by mirror images, and quite obviously displaced. He lowered his staff, spoke a word, and triggered three symbols, which instantly killed Tetsuyo and drove Mike and Lini insane.
Lini gibbered, Mike fled in confused terror, Kijj dimension-doored to close with the mage, and Murphy fired off a ray from his precast prismatic eye and another spell, neither of which had much effect. Melkor shot back a prismatic spray, turning Murphy to stone. The golems -- shield guardians -- turned to beat on Kijj, but he was blinky and mirror imaged and all, and they didn't manage to actually hurt him.
But then, Kijj's attacks against Melkor were similarly ineffective, the evil mage's starmantle and stoneskin reducing the few that hit to the point where the remaining damage -- all of which was transferred to the shield guardians -- was barely noticeable, and quickly healed.
All might have been lost if Sonnet and Morgan hadn't shown up. Sonnet and Sawyer raced headlong into the glyphs, and were both driven insane, and Sawyer was also stunned. Morgan stayed back around the corner, instead, and used the Orb of Good he'd retrieved from Sonnet to heal Lini, who then healed Mike (after Mike prismatic-sprayed her), who healed Sonnet and Murphy while Morgan teleported Lini to heal Kijj, who by that point had taken down both guardians, but was in terrible shape, having taken the full brunt of all the enemies' attacks for several rounds (and would have been dust thrice over if not for a series of lucky saves and blinks).
Sonnet complained bitterly that Lini hadn't taken the time to heal Sawyer, but fired off a series of silence spells to make things harder for the wizard, ending up with one on Kijj. Since damaging the mage was so difficult, Kijj grappled him instead. And missed. But got him on the second try, after Mike put up a wall of stone to block his passage, and Murphy dimensional anchored him.
All this time, Murphy and Melkor had had Mordenkainen's Swords slashing at each other, but Murphy was a LOT easier to hit in melee, and went down under the assault. Lini went back to heal him before he was killed (the swords wouldn't change targets on their own just because the guy they were slashing went down), leaving Kijj and Morgan to try to find some way to damage the grappled mage, while Mike counterspelled his silent, still spells (using Disjunct) and Sonnet made things worse for everyone by repeatedly using her rod of wonder (doing 50 damage to Kijj with a fireball and lightning bolt, and not a single point to Melkor).
Then the Guardians got back up, having healed the 100+ points of overkill Kijj had done to each of them some time before. And went back down again, to a fireball and some additional damage done to the mage by Morgan's rod of force. Then got back up. And went down again thanks to Murphy's chain lightning. And got back up. And went back down again as Kijj (who'd switched to his admantium battleaxe from his natural weapons) FINALLY got the lucky hit he needed with a stoneskin-piercing weapon, and did the last 8 damage needed to drop the mage, finishing him with some semi-draconic teeth to the throat.
Then got back up... but didn't attack. Which was odd, but (so the party thought) fortunate, because now they had the earrings that controlled them, and could use them as their OWN guardians.
There was no sign of Melkor's spellbook anywhere, so they had Lini cast Speak With Dead, expecting it to fail. Somewhat to their surprise, the ghostly form of Melkor appeared, and started demanding that they give him back his stuff.
Although Melkor's 'ghost' refused to confirm it, Murphy suspected that the mage was not actually dead, instead having used a Clone to revive himself instantly. Eventually, in response to repeated threats to go warn Frost of their mission (ensuring its failure), they agreed to give the golems back to him after the mission was over -- until then, they'd be hostages to his good behavior. In return, Melkor agreed to a truce with them, and to provide discounted magical item creation services on their behalf, up to some small limit.
There were still a few days -- well, okay, weeks -- left until it was time to actually invade the lair, but there was nothing left to do but wait -- according to Melkor's notes the lair was another mile and a half down the corridor.
last week | next week
Melkor had some really quite ridiculously valuable stuff on his body, including a ring of protection +5 and freedom of movement, which should have let him escape the grapple. Which wouldn't have actually helped him much, since he was always hedged in in a silenced area and surrounded by enemies anyway, with Mike countering his spells. Actually, there was one spell he wanted to cast but couldn't, but if he'd been casting with components Mike wouldn't have missed ANY of his spellcraft checks.
