World of Prime: Campaign Journal #70

The Dark Forest, pt II

One tree has retreated from the outskirts of the battle, and begins to walk away. Slowly, as the trees only move at 10' per round. The party follows the tree form a safe distance, expecting it to lead them to its creator. For once they demonstrate true patience, as the journey lasts for five days.

On the last day of travel the Ranger realizes the tree is no longer moving in a straight line. Obviously is it maneuvering the party into a trap, a fact that the party absorbs with equanimity. Perhaps due to misplaced confidence, as an ambush by a master assassin vine almost kills the Ranger in a single round, and now the party is surrounded by hostile vegetable matter.

The Cleric casts Blade Barrier: the lawnmower version, blocking most of the other assassin vines from entering the fray. As the party beats the remaining assassin vines into shrubbery, trees begin showing up in increasingly large numbers. The Bard casts Fire Shield and begins darting through the woods, setting everything that attacks him on fire.This is a devestatingly effective tactic until a voice booms out, ordering the trees to stop being so dumb. Two treants have arrived and taken control of the battle.

Their first move is to cast Sleet Storm over the battlefield, which turns out be just as annoying for them as it was for the party every time they tried to use it. Seriously, what is the purpose of this spell? Fortunately the Druid dispels the effect, allowing the battle to resume. Then the Bard and Druid do the invisible-bear-from-above trick again. This time the Druid-Bear lands between two angry treants, but thanks to Invisibility and bad luck they can't land a single blow. After the Bard and Barbarian rush over to help, the end comes quickly. The Ranger and Cleric finish off the assassin vines and it's all over.

Until a stunningly attractive dryad strolls on the field and asks what the party is doing to their trees.

Obviously this gets the Bard's attention. Conversation ensues, in which the dryad confesses they aren't actually her trees, just something she was looking after, and also that she's not a dryad but a Storm Giant shapeshifting into one. She turns back into a male giant (still stunning, however) and asks the party for help in doing a little light regime change. Turns out the King of the Storm Giants has banned shapeshifting in his kingdom, and is otherwise a hide-bound traditionalist incapable of adapting to the modern age.

Fegr explains the plan: the annual renewal of vows is about to occur at a 12-hour feast. If the party can tell a story so long and exciting that the King loses track of time, the loyalty oaths will expire. This will allow the rebels, led by Fegr, to stand by and do nothing while the party eliminates the King. Then Fegr will assume the throne, allow the party to claim the rewards for slaying the King and his loyal court, and promise to help them against the dragon someday.

The party is dubious - Fegr is clearly shifty as - but agree to come meet the giants and determine for themselves whether the situation warrants regicide. But only after Fegr throws a Hammer of Thunderbolts into the mix as a potential reward. 

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #69

The Dark Forest, pt I

Marching south to the unknown, the party comes to the edge of a vast forest. Plunging heedlessly into the sea of leaves, they soon hear another party coming their direction.

Immediately the party seeks cover, hiding in the trees or, in the druid's case, as a tree.

The intruders are merely the remnants of a gnomish tribe that is now, after years of increasing harassment, abandoning the forest. They are startled by the party's sudden barrage of questions, but offer nothing more than advice. "They got Harry," the gnomes say. "It's not worth staying anymore."

"They," it seems, are the trees themselves. The party is uncertain how much gnomish deductions can be trusted, but wish the creatures well and continue their headlong march into danger.

A brief encounter with a violent vine does not dissuade them; neither do a group of shambling mounds of dirt and leaves and rotting vegetation. They continue deeper into the forest despite these warning signs. Finally the trees themselves organize an attack, picking up their roots and stomping into battle.

At this point the Druid has determined that there is definitely something unusual about this forest. The stench of evil radiates off of what should be purely neutral plants. They use powerful magic to find the path to the source of contamination, only to be ambushed by an even larger force of trees.

The Wizard and Cleric employ Blade Barrier and Wall of Fire, decimating the trees handily. Who would have guessed that chainsaws and flamethrowers would be a tree's weakness? However, some still get through, and the Wizard almost gets crushed by a falling log. He responds by transforming into a Hydra, which at least has the advantage of rapid healing. Meanwhile, the Bard sets himself on fire and runs through the battlefield, provoking futile attacks of opportunity that set fire to the trees.

All of this is clearly being controlled by some intelligent force; the Druid enters the nearest oak and begins searching the Root Network for another mind. He can sense the being but not fully locate it. But the rest of the party is still fighting, and soon enough the treant has to come out of hiding to save his flock.

The instant he reveals himself, the Druid-Bear attacks. Like a Maine Coon cat on a Temu scratching post, the Bear shreds the forest master. Only at the last instant do the tree-creature's eyes flicker, from dark to light; but then it is dead.

Mysteries abound; what can turn a treant to evil? And are there more? 

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #68

Kek's Shopping Emporium Foreclosure Sale

Adventurers are nothing if not feckless. The Golden Empress' empire is shattered and leaderless, her army broken and her best magic stolen, but she is not dead. Nonetheless, the party would rather go shopping than finish taking out the trash.

The journey out of the kingdom reinforces what a thankless task that would be. A simple village encounter suddenly turns dangerous as a girl selling barley cakes dominates the Wizard with a glance. The Wizard then attempts to Disintegrate the DruidBear - luckily the weakest possible attack as the bear has a fantastic Fortitude save. After a comedy of errors where the Barbarian fails to arm-wrestle the Wizard and the Bard blinks from house to house terrorizing the locals with his own Dimension Doors in the walls, the DruidBear manages to knock out the Wizard without killing him, and the Bard successfully breaks the witch's enchantment.

A search of the area yields nothing more than a crow feather. Somehow the sorceress has launched an attack via an innocent and then fled. The party takes this troubling development as further incentive to just bag off and leave.

When they arrive at Kek's they are greeted as usual, right up until they enter the throne room. Kek has divined their treachery - or perhaps just finally launched his own. In either case he makes a full-force attack against the party... and gets stomped.

The fight is so one-sided the DM's notes cannot even reconstruct it. Despite bitter howls of treachery from the party and an immediate attempt to retreat, there is never really any danger. The mummies burn, the golems shatter, and soon it is Kek retreating through magic to some unknown hidden hole... or perhaps through his portal to parts unknowable.

The party throws some walls of stone around the portal, cutting it off from the water. In a few years the entire area will become a lake. They loot his treasury for a few choice items and crush all his remaining machinery. Considering this sufficient, they strike off into the great unknown, looking for new foes and new adventures. 

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #67

The Golden Empress

The party works its way back to the surface with no opposition; the forces that maintained the interest and attention of all those supernatural beings has waned, and it is now just a dead volcano. But the party still holds the interests of certain parties, and in the forest outside they find their old confidant Alys the bard.

First they have to rescue her from a pair of hell-hounds. She explains that she dares not use her magic, for fear it will reveal her location to her enemies (who shall remain unnamed, for the same reason). 

She has come to the party seeking assistance. Rhian has renamed herself the Golden Empress, reaching heights of power previously unimaginable. Soon she will be unstoppable. The Resistance against the Golden Empress's totalitarian rule  - such as it is - has prepared a strategy. They know where the Empress will be on a given date, and can sneak a wagon full of hidden adventurers in to ambush the Empress and destroy her once and for all. In exchange the party can keep all the treasure, including the fabled Helm of Brilliance.

The party quickly (for them, at least) agrees to this scheme. They travel through the wilderness to the edge of the kingdom and wait patiently (for them, at least) while Ayls fetches a farm wagon. Then, hidden under bales of hay, they travel into the city, waiting for Ayls's signal to leap out and attack.

However, the get a slightly different signal, when six Frost Giants leap next the wagon and smash it to bits, trying to kill the adventurers hidden within. The Bard escapes, seeking to flank the giants, only to discover an army of archers has ringed the battlefield. It's a trap! One carefully set by Alys never actually telling a lie. She used the classic Bard trick of the Oracle of Delphi - "a great empire shall fall," without specifying precisely which set of enemies she was hiding from or setting a trap for.

The Wizard shuts down most of the archers, but things look pretty dangerous until the Bard gets a Fear spell off and forces most of the giants to retreat for a few rounds. With their battle-line broken, the Ranger, Barbarian, and Bear overwhelm the giants piece by piece. The last death is Alys, as she tries to mind-control the Barbarian, fails, and is immediately cut down.

This leads to certain mysteries, such as how did a bard cast a high-level sorcerer spell? But more importantly is what to do next, and the party, having barely survived a brutal battle, immediately decides to press on and end the Golden Empress once and for all.

They know where the palace is, after all, and they have Invisibility, Disguise, and Glibness. Surely they can sneak past a sentry or two. As usual, the process is more drawn-out and violent than necessary, but eventually the advance into the throne room.

The woman sitting on the throne is not the Empress, though she is wearing the Helm of Brilliance. Her protection seems weak, being only a handful of low-rank sorceresses and a pair of Frost Giants. But as the giants advance and the casters prepare counter-spells, the lady flicks her hand and sends a Prismatic Spray against the party, so neatly framed in the doorway.

The Barbarian is hit by a red ray and bursts into flames. But the damage is minimal, and in any case he shrugs off the magic by dint of rage-induced spell resistance. The Cleric is struck by a stronger effect, but makes his save. The Druid is immune to the green ray's poison. But the Ranger is not, and dies on the spot; the Wizard, bathed in violet light, goes violently insane; the Bard strikes a permanent pose as he is turned to stone. 

A single spell, and half the party is down! Yet the remaining members manage to kill the woman in the helm before she can act a second time and trigger the device to self-destruct - an effect that would have certainly slain everyone still standing in the room.

After mopping up the rest of the resistance, the Cleric undoes the various debilitations. They even have enough tael to restore the Ranger's lost rank, though once again it leaves them broke. They hardly care - they have taken possession of one of the few known artifacts on the continent. That the Empress has still somehow evaded them does not trouble them overly; they believe her army to be broken and disorganized. Loaded with conventional wealth from the Necropolis, they set out to visit Kek for a shopping a trip.

Likely to be their final shopping trip, in fact, as they discuss the obvious next step is destroying Kek and looting his empire for more tael and artifacts with which to face the dragon. Few tears are shed over this inevitable development, as Kek, despite his usefulness, is after all an insane mummy lord trying to destroy the world.

 

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #66

The Necropolis: Philosophy Debate

The party spends an inordinate amount of time discussing strategies for dashing into the Erinyes and snatching their key by surprise, only to ultimately settle on walking in and just taking it.

The squads of glaive-wielding demons do their job, which is to say, keep the Barbarian busy for several whole rounds. The winged demons vaunted archery power is blunted by the Bard flying in with strong Mirror Images and close combat with his halberd; after a futile round they switch to his one true weakness. The Bard and the leader of the Erinyes spend the rest of the battle occupied in... other activities.

But the distraction was too much, and the Ranger is winning the ranged battle. Several other members of the party resist the lady's enticements, proving this really is just a Bard thing, and soon enough the battle is over.

As they extract the Bard from the embrace of the last Erinyes, her final words are sigh of relief. Five hundred years in a dungeon is a fate worse than death and the party has released the devils from their imprisonment, albeit at the cost of their lives. 

The Necropolis: Throw-down in the throne room

The hallway to the throne room is trapped with explosions every five feet. Rather than deal with a hundred of feet of damage, the Bard Dimension Doors the party to the next door. This reduces the problem to only a few trapped squares, at the expense of leaving them no easy retreat.

They insert the twin keys, open the doors, and step into the next room. This floor is trapped as well, but only with Dispel Magic intended to debuff them. This proves even more restrictive than the explosions; the party clears a few squares to fight from, buffs up their melee, and sends the Bard in to scout.

As he flies around the dark room he discovers the one thing they never expected: the massive bulk of a dragon!

The beast rouses itself and spits a line of acid at the party, followed by charging into melee. The Druid-bear is obviously the greater threat, especially as it is currently enshrouded in spells, so the dragon grapples the beast and tries to roll across multiple de-buffing trapped squares. Unfortunately, it fails as the bear finds an anchor point in a cracked stone and holds his ground.

At this close range it becomes clear that the dragon is, in fact, dead. However, a zombie dragon requires a staggering amount of damage to dismantle. This would not normally be a concern as the bear and Barbarian throw fistfuls of dice, except for the minor detail of the appearance of the Lich.

This is an unwelcome development, to say the least. His first words are met by a barrage of attacks, all of which pass harmlessly through. This is merely a projection; the real lich is hidden somewhere else in the room. The Bard sweeps through the air, searching, while the rest of the party starts making saving throws. Once per round, the lich's image points at a target and utters a word of death.

Remarkably, the party keeps surviving. The Bard finds a throne on a high dias in the middle of the room with a corpse seated on it. He quickly lands and beheads the corpse, but it is a mere prop. The rest of the party, having dispatched the dragon, rush over to investigate and the Cleric quickly realizes the throne itself is the lich's phylactery. For once the bear's claws are ineffective against dull stone, so the party breaks out all the blunt weapons they have - warhammers and halberds, but the supreme weapon is an ordinary sledgehammer in the Barbarian's bag. While they reduce the throne to dust the lich's programmed projected continues its assualt; the Bard, once again, is the only one to fall to the mystical assault. His lifeless body slumps to the ground just a round before the throne does, its rubble mixing with the dust of the lich's mortal remains.

Behind the throne they find a chest with the wealth intended to fund the lich's conquest of the surface world. Powerful magic items collected across the ages from previous adventurers and so unique they seem as if they were collected with the party in mind, and a wealth of tael so great it erases the loss of the Bard's death and more.

What they do not find is the Orb of Dragons. Because this, they realize, was always a myth. A lie spread by the dragon to encourage parties to spend themselves fighting his foes. As satisfied as they are with the wealth, they are actually no closer to solving the problem of the dragon.

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #65

The Necropolis: Bard on Ice

The aboleth waits for the party in the center of its lair, holding a torch in one tentacle and a scroll in the other. The threat is clear: negotiate or see the treasure burned.

There is little room to move, though. The aboleth halves its price, and halves it again, but the party is unwilling to part with anything. At least the talking phase has given the monster the opening shot.

It launches a lighting bolt to middling effect while its rangers focus fire on the Bard. Unfortunately he had the sense to put up Protection From Arrows before the fight and his defenses hold.

The Ranger kills a skum with arrows; the Druid and Wizard both cast Wall of Fire, trapping the skum rangers in-between, Unable to see targets, they retreat, taking significant damage. However, the party is also unable to see, and consequently must move to flank their own battlefield control.

They are met at the end of the wall by the aboleth (wearing the scroll as a paper hat) and another lightining bolt. The Ranger appears to fire with deadly effect while the Barbarian and Druid-Bear dish out massive damage, but the Wizard reveals the truth with a well-aimed Dispel Magic the evaporates the aboleth's Projection, leaving nothing but air.

Now the remaining skum rangers close to archery range. They are met by a Fireball from the Wizard and a Cone of Cold from the Bard, and that's that for them. The Wizard has permanent See Invisibility, so he moves forward, searching for the aboleth. It tries to dominate the Barbarian but fails; the bear and swordsman close to melee and demolish the creature despite its multiple layers of miss chances from Invisibility and Displacement.

Searching the lair, they find the real scroll, marked out by a figure with horns on the back. Now they have everything they need; after resting for a few days, they venture into the lich's dungeon.

A surprising amount of caution is used opening the door, but eventually the Cleric and Wizard read their scrolls on the statues. The door grinds open to the tolling of twelve bells. It reveals an empty hallway with three doors leading out, each labeled in the Common tongue: The Hall of the Many, The Hall of the Few, and The Hall of the One. 

After much debate they smash down the door to the hall of the Many. Stepping inside the huge 200x200 hall, they are met by a shower of arrows out of the darkness (as the room is lit only near their door). They go to the hall of the One; this is an underground maze. Before exploring it, they decide to try the hall of the Few, finding it the same as the hall of the Many.

This time they charge in despite the arrows and encounter a wall of skeletal halberdiers. The creatures are not particularly dangerous, but they are numerous, and with the help of the skeletal archers shooting over their heads, they are inflicting small but steady damage. The Bard, in an excess of courage, teleports behind the archers, only to discover several squads of skeletal knights.

Our heroes still fear lances; the Wizard cuts the room in half with a Wall of Fire, saving the Bard's life. This despite all the kvetching about the wall's interference in the previous battle. The Barbarian is in his element, his Great Cleave feat allowing him to dish out uncapped damage against the hordes of skeletons, putting even the bear to shame. One troop of halberdiers flanks the party; the Wizard eliminates it with a fireball. The Cleric vaporizes dozens of skeletons before deciding this is not really a good use of divine power.

When the wall of fire comes down, things get real. The Barbarian is reduced to single hit-points by lance charges, and the Ranger and Druid-bear take significant damage as well. Now the Cleric deploys his magic to good effect, destroying half the creatures in one go, while the others are chopped up in more traditional methods.

After a careful and thorough search, cut short only by the tolling of eleven bells, they determine that the sole treasure in the room is a chest containing 1,000 lbs of obsidian; the party has no use for this. They go through the door at the back of the room, only to find a repeat of what they just fought.

Unable to bear the thought of mindlessly grinding on hundreds of skeletons again, they choose the dangers of the maze.

Following the Ranger's unerring sense of direction, they wander in the maze for an hour. When the bell tolls ten, they find a chest with a half-ton of silver (again: not worth carrying) and a pouch of pearls worth 300 gp. Another hour finds a pouch of jacinth, worth 3,000 gp. Yet another hour discovers onyx, worth 7,500 gp; but at this point the toiling of the bells is beginning to unnerve them. The Druid casts Find the Path, giving up on the remaining chests of treasure, and they arrive at the end of the maze as the bell strikes seven.

Here they find the reverse of the entrance. Listening at the door of the Many reveals a scholarly debate occurring inside; when the Bard knocks on the door, a bearded demon opens it and shushes him, but otherwise the party is ignored by the attractive winged ladies and their demonic audience. The room is well-lit, revealing a large iron key hanging on the side wall. The party decides to investigate elsewhere before lunging for the obvious McGuffin.

The door of the Few radiates cold; the Barbarian smashes it down with his sledgehammer. The Bard illuminates the room with magic; while they can't see everything, they do see an empty room with a large iron key hanging on a side wall. After much banter the Bard and Barbarian race through the empty room to grab the key.

This of course is a trap; once they reach the far wall, the entrance is sealed off by a Wall of Ice. The Druid punches through a few inches of the wall while the Ranger finishes carving a hole with his sword. After hearing a dozen mysterious popping sounds, the Bard decides that running across the room is a bad idea and teleports himself and the Barbarian onto the other side of the door.

Just in time; a dozen chain demons race up to the door. The party has one round to prepare and chooses to retreat down the corridor towards the other demons, on the theory that a long empty corridor is better than being trapped against the wall. The demons teleport through the ice wall, taking up positions on the other side, and a huge ice demon simply smashes the wall down and casts an Ice Storm at the party.

The spell doesn't do much damage, so the chain demons rush into battle, hindered somewhat by the narrowness of the hall. This proves to be a deciding factor, as they are bunched up and perfect bait for fireballs and flame strikes and tentacles. None of these spells affect the ice demon, which answers with multiple cones of cold - the last of which sees the Bard fail a saving thrown and turn into a Popsicle, saved from certain death only by the instant action of the Cleric's healing magic.

Now the Barbarian and Bear charge through the tentacles and close to melee with the ice demon. It should have been a tight fight, but the tentacles have grappled the demon, costing him a significant chunk of his armor class; consequently, the melee attacks prove effective and the terrifying monster goes down in one round.

This battle was less effort than the skeleton battle, but somewhat more dangerous as the Bard and Wizard came very close to freezing to death. Once again, however, the action economy has seen a group of heroes take down a single large foe. But now there is the hall of the Many to deal with; will the winged ladies and bearded demons prove more of a threat? For it is clear the party needs their key, and obvious that the bound demons will not surrender it without a fight, despite their refined politeness. 

 

World of Prime: Campaign Journal #64

The Necropolis, part V: Solving the Gordian knot like Alexander

Faced with a logical puzzle, the party decides to implement their oldest and bestest strategy: brute force.

The fact that these puzzle pieces are iconic monsters from eldritch lore does not inhibit them. Displaying at least a minor adaptation to the nature of this world, they lay in wait until a pair of chuul go out hunting. The ambush is over almost instantly, and the party rushes to implement the rest of their plan before the eye tyrant is aware that war has broken out.

As soon as they are in sight of the tower the Bard Dimension Doors them the top, backed up by the Druid flying in as a bat. However, their reconnaissance was imperfect; the roof of the tower is missing, and the party immediately falls into a pool with several started and hungry chuuls. The eye tyrant aims his anti-magic cone down into the water, rendering the party totally blind as their night-vision goggles shut down.

The Bard escaped this fate with his Cloak of the Bat, but now he and the Druid are dealing with eye rays. The Cleric and Ranger are swimming for the edge of the water while the Barbarian decides that, even blind and swimming, he can still take any number of over-stuffed lobsters.

This might have been mildly dangerous, until the Druid turns into a bear and drops down on the eye tyrant. This legendary creature is a potent foe in magical combat, but not melee; it disintegrates in a burst of gore, shredded by claws and fangs. The Druid-Bear falls into the pool with the Barbarian and the chuul; without antimagic protection, the lobsters are dispatched before the Ranger even gets out of the water. The Wizard arrives in the doorway, having run in on foot, only to contribute nothing but sarcastic applause.

That removes one party from consideration. Now they approach the ghasts and make a deal, trading the Wizard's giant zombie for their half of the secret. They are aware that the now unstable dynamic almost certainly sees the ghasts and the aboleth teaming up against them, so the very next day they attack. The ghasts are still in their camp, having spent the time finishing another bone construct from the bits of the zombie rather than seeking out alliances. However, they are not fooled, and not found unprepared.

Or rather, they thought they were prepared, until the Bard teleports the Barbarian to the back of the line where he instantly executes one of the spell-casting ghasts. (This prompts a bit of discussion about how teleport works, and a general agreement that in the future, being teleported leaves one unable to act until the next round, as the party rather fears the instant assassination technique they've just discovered.)

Meanwhile the rest of the fight is hardly any more challenging. The Druid-Bear melee machine is the perfect antidote to the bone constructs; the Barbarian and Bard in the back lines are cleaning up spell-casters despite several Flame Strikes. The Bard smoothly switches between melee and magic, interrupting the spell-casters and shaping the battlefield with Black Tentacles - even though they are dispelled, they cost the enemy precious time, and time is one thing they don't have as the magic resistant Barbarian is a spell-caster's worst nightmare. Having successfully countered both prongs of the ghast's defenses, the party makes such short work of them that the Wizard and Ranger are reduced to spectators.

They choose to press on to the aboleth before resting, hoping to catch it by surprise. This fails, of course, because the aboleth is literally an evil genius; but at the same time, the creature suspects it is outclassed. Can it negotiate the party into some more profitable outcome - or will it test its magic against them while they are at least partially depleted?