Online Session 64 (10/20/14)

Here is the link to the transcript for online session 64. We're now messing around with the Roll20 web browser gaming interface, so I've saved this one as a Word .doc for the time being.

Session 65 (10/17/14)

Essel, Verget the 13th, 838 ID

After unsuccessfully searching for hidden exits from the chamber where they discovered the illithid skull, the PCs decide to drag the copper-dowsed dwarf back to the entrance area and then proceed down the one tunnel they had yet to explore. They spied an unstable chamber covered with webs of cracks and nooks in it, and a damaged cart track. A single mine cart remained, and from this they saw glints of something shining...so Gruulsh and Wendel went into to get a closer look, while the rest of the party stayed near the entrance. It turns out there was a pressure plate trap, so rather than attempt to disable it, Wendel recommends the party stay clear of the cart and the coins stacked within, and press onward. They do so, but somehow their very presence manages to trigger an enormous 10' x 15' worked stone block falling in the entryway! Had Wendel removed the coins earlier...the rest of the party might have been completely crushed...

They pressed on to the next area, and found a ribbed looking, naturally eroded cavern where some water was dripping from the mountainside above. Four strange stalagmites were scattered through the place, and there were weird, spongy net-like surfaces on the ceiling which seem like they might have been left behind by the miners. Unfortunately, as they began to search the walls for anything less than obvious, they were attacked by deadly Strength-sapping strands, as the stalagmites turned out to be aberrations! Furthermore, the things on the ceiling joined the battle, lurkers above who would drop and then attempt to grapple the heroes, a dangerous proposition if they've had their Strength drained. It was a dodgy battle, with Ballyhoo, Mistlethroe and Wendel finding themselves in potential danger; inevitably the PCs proved victorious over the aberrations. They found some treasure in a shallow pit on the floor beneath where one of the creatures was prepping its ambush. It was also in this battle that Ballyhoo and Baro discovered their teleport-like spells did not seem to function in the Crowslode... perhaps this explains the abjuration the evoker detected near the entrance to the caverns.

They took the corridor running east, and found a place where rivulets of water running down the walls were beginning to pool, and a heap of humanoid bones and scales which they deduced might belong to troglodytes, since they are aware the Marrow Suckers and other tribes are reported to dwell beneath the Vernal Wall. Within the bones, they find a shale-encrusted, slowly pulsing egg which must have been hidden here by one of the stone ropers in the previous fight, and they claim the thing, deciding to press further along where the water was gathering. A larger cavern, with dank, opaque water at least 4-5' deep, full of bioluminous cavern fish, the surface slowly rippling and undulating. There is an islet in the center of the chamber with what a cloak-shrouded, small humanoid skeleton sitting alone near a lit lantern on a leaning pole. Badger fires an arrow at the figure to see if it moves, and then the party decides to search elsewhere and then return here later, once the mages discern there are numerous sources of magic on the islet...including necromancy.

They next come across a cantine of some sort that had been set up by the miners, who must have assumed their operation would be quite large and prosperous. A number of stone benches and tables hewn from the cavern floor itself are in the place, dubbed the 'Crows Nest' in dwarven on a small sign near the entrance. To the south of the area is a semi-circular bar-like structure. Stone bowls and crude utensils lie strewn about in webs and dust. The 'scout team' of Gruulsh and Wendel heads towards the bar, with the rogue searching all the while for any traps...there are no 'traps', it turns out, but a massive and terrifying umber hulk has taken up residence in a burrow at the middle of the bar, and it 'rises to the occasion', using its confusion ray on the two scouts! Shenanigans commence, but luckily Baro, Badger and Mistlethroe are on the job, raining down hostile magic upon the thing whilst Solveig turns its burrow into a thick mud with a transmutation. spell. It is hard to fell, but manages to only get one heavy attack off on Gruulsh who can take it, before Baro's disintegrate erases it from existence! A close call...if the beast had been able to take action again, it might have slain one or more of the confused characters.

They find it's treasure within the burrow, after digging through the mud, and set Monch to identify an item, which he does for the cloak of the mountebank, that is given to Wendel. The PCs heal and then decide to rest and regain some of their spent magic, before pressing further into the Crowslode.

PCs: Badger, Ballyhoo, Baro, Gruulsh, Solveig, Wendel