Running the Gauntlet
Sep. 21st, 2011 11:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
terryclothLast Friday we actually did play Pathfinder, I just forgot to summarize it until now.
Apparently the silence coin was too annoying to carry with them now that the bards they knew about were gone [since everyone forgot it existed], so they left it behind in a corner of the room while they moved on to search the rest of the room for the portals. Lilia stayed in the control room with her summoned teleporting demons to work the controls and support the rest of the party, while the others explored the middle of the right side of the room, until they were blocked by another giant door ('door 3', counting counterclockwise from the control room) unless they wanted to go out onto the catwalk.
Alex heard some signs of movement in the back of the room, so she shouted out, "Open door 4!", thinking that they could lure the enemies into a trap between doors 3 and 4 and then shoot them safely through the window, since the area between 3 and 4 was another balcony overlooking the pool.
Unfortunately, the enemies knew where the control room was, and even if they didn't understand Alex's language [they didn't] they could tell that someone had to be in it since a door was opening. So the three mephit bards that had come as reinforcements through the portals headed there, while the snakes moved through the now-open door 4 to search for the person who'd shouted. Seeing Lilia at the controls, they opened up with a barrage of harsh language, killing her instantly.
Artican was able to keep her from actually staying dead with a quick Breath of Life spell, and Alex and the Dragonne were able to take out the bards before they could do much more damage -- they got a bunch of shots off at the dragonne, but Ironhoof has put a stoneskin spell on it that absorbed most of the impact. After shooting up some mephits, Alex turned invisible and ran for where the portals were spewing out an endless stream of snakes, while Ironhoof tried to hold back the tide and keep their attention all by himself.
Which worked, more or less, although it was obvious that he wasn't going to *win* against an endless stream of snake monks, especially when they were usually supported by a mephit bard (the Dragonne was flying all over chasing them down, but more kept coming, sporadically). Lilia helped by summoning a Lilend bard of her own, and Artican summoned a pair of spiritual weapons (ghostly canaries), although that didn't really help all that much.
Alex did manage to find the first portal, on a ramp at the far end of the room that sloped down into the pool, with rivers of flowing water every few feet, and carefully (so as not to break her invisibility) picked up the candles to dispel it. One of the mephit bards was hiding near the portal, though, chased there by the dragonne, and when it saw the candles mysteriously vanishing, it used a glitterdust to reveal the culprit. Fortunately, around that time the portal finally collapsed. Fortunate because some of the snakes on Ironhoof now saw the sneaking thief and turned to attack her, instead, and she was a much softer target.
Alex whined about her sudden lack of stealth, so Artican used an obscuring mist to give her somewhere to hide even if she was glowing like a christmas tree. She tossed some coins into the water to cover the sound of her crossing one of the streams, and managed to bluff the two snakes near her into jumping into the water after her -- at which point they were swarmed by wights. That bought some time for her and Artican to snipe candles from the other portal on the ramp, in the far corner of the room from where they'd come in, while the Dragonne held off the snakes that came out of it and Ironhoof finished off the snakes that had stayed behind to fight him (half of them running off after Alex helped a lot) and then helped the wights kill off the ones who'd gone swimming.
As the portal closed, one of the remaining snakes shouted out in Ignan, "Protect the last portal! They've closed all the others!" The party had no idea where this last portal was (other than 'somewhere in earshot') but they knew that it was bound to be well-guarded.
last session | next session
Apparently the silence coin was too annoying to carry with them now that the bards they knew about were gone [since everyone forgot it existed], so they left it behind in a corner of the room while they moved on to search the rest of the room for the portals. Lilia stayed in the control room with her summoned teleporting demons to work the controls and support the rest of the party, while the others explored the middle of the right side of the room, until they were blocked by another giant door ('door 3', counting counterclockwise from the control room) unless they wanted to go out onto the catwalk.
Alex heard some signs of movement in the back of the room, so she shouted out, "Open door 4!", thinking that they could lure the enemies into a trap between doors 3 and 4 and then shoot them safely through the window, since the area between 3 and 4 was another balcony overlooking the pool.
Unfortunately, the enemies knew where the control room was, and even if they didn't understand Alex's language [they didn't] they could tell that someone had to be in it since a door was opening. So the three mephit bards that had come as reinforcements through the portals headed there, while the snakes moved through the now-open door 4 to search for the person who'd shouted. Seeing Lilia at the controls, they opened up with a barrage of harsh language, killing her instantly.
Artican was able to keep her from actually staying dead with a quick Breath of Life spell, and Alex and the Dragonne were able to take out the bards before they could do much more damage -- they got a bunch of shots off at the dragonne, but Ironhoof has put a stoneskin spell on it that absorbed most of the impact. After shooting up some mephits, Alex turned invisible and ran for where the portals were spewing out an endless stream of snakes, while Ironhoof tried to hold back the tide and keep their attention all by himself.
Which worked, more or less, although it was obvious that he wasn't going to *win* against an endless stream of snake monks, especially when they were usually supported by a mephit bard (the Dragonne was flying all over chasing them down, but more kept coming, sporadically). Lilia helped by summoning a Lilend bard of her own, and Artican summoned a pair of spiritual weapons (ghostly canaries), although that didn't really help all that much.
Alex did manage to find the first portal, on a ramp at the far end of the room that sloped down into the pool, with rivers of flowing water every few feet, and carefully (so as not to break her invisibility) picked up the candles to dispel it. One of the mephit bards was hiding near the portal, though, chased there by the dragonne, and when it saw the candles mysteriously vanishing, it used a glitterdust to reveal the culprit. Fortunately, around that time the portal finally collapsed. Fortunate because some of the snakes on Ironhoof now saw the sneaking thief and turned to attack her, instead, and she was a much softer target.
Alex whined about her sudden lack of stealth, so Artican used an obscuring mist to give her somewhere to hide even if she was glowing like a christmas tree. She tossed some coins into the water to cover the sound of her crossing one of the streams, and managed to bluff the two snakes near her into jumping into the water after her -- at which point they were swarmed by wights. That bought some time for her and Artican to snipe candles from the other portal on the ramp, in the far corner of the room from where they'd come in, while the Dragonne held off the snakes that came out of it and Ironhoof finished off the snakes that had stayed behind to fight him (half of them running off after Alex helped a lot) and then helped the wights kill off the ones who'd gone swimming.
As the portal closed, one of the remaining snakes shouted out in Ignan, "Protect the last portal! They've closed all the others!" The party had no idea where this last portal was (other than 'somewhere in earshot') but they knew that it was bound to be well-guarded.
last session | next session
