Lumping two short Friday sessions (20+21) and a full Sunday session together (22) for this update. Ended up not playing our normal session Sunday 4/17 due to Rogtar/Mark and Cowl/Chris participating in the Bernie Sanders hipster rally democratic caucus which only ran ~6 hours overtime.
Last session ended with the party escaping the City of the Glass Pool and stone shaping the wall shut behind them, leaving Jobin to his fate. Chase and I played out what happened during his attempted escape - it involved a potion of burrow, a potion of air bubble, the stone cavern floor, a Survival of 0 for determining direction, a potion of gaseous form, and being successfully reunited with the party 10 or so hours later by merely gaseously floating past the stone giants working to collapse the tunnel to them. And for some reason Jobin thinks only 2 hours have passed, nothing suspicious at all.
Day Tracker
Start Day 160
Jobin arrives 10 hours later+2 hr march back to city (161)
Fight with illithid and free slaves (161)
Roughly 4 day trip to Neverlight (165)
Neverlight to surface (Day 167, 8 days since first assaulting City)
The Ramblings of Jobin
Attack upon entering:1 Eye, 1 Lt, 2 Whips, 1 Priest, Dagapre - 4,600 EXP
Slave Pens Assault: 2 Whips, 2 Lts, 1 Captain, 4 Citizen - 1,800 EXPSCP's: +8 (total 31)
Second/Third:
7 Fungal Dancers - 8,000 EXP
Defeating the Avatar of Zuggtmoy and saving Neverlight Grove - 12,200 EXPYestabrod and Amalgam - 6,400 EXP
Sovereign Phylo's Corpse Lotus: 6,800 EXP
DM Notes
Lessee...lot to talk about!
Most of the first session was the fight against the illithids Dagapre (a witch, now dead) and Zanticor (powerful arcane caster, fled the battle after his allies fell). The fight against the few guards in the slave building seemed underwhelming and the party fled through the secret passage to the north that the Rakshasha Rukh told them about when they spared his life during session 13.
The Slaves
The next session introduced the former slaves (total 39) they managed to save:
Dwarves - 6 - of Gauntlegrym
Halfings - 6 - of Lurabar and Iraebor
Humans - 18 - from all over the area
Svirfneblin - 5 - from an un-met clan to the north
Half Elf - 2 - traveling “entertainers” from Athkatla
Geronmen (currently has no equipment) - defender of Clan Battlehammer and Paladin of Clangeddin - captured during travel to Gauntlgrym with the other dwarves. Has sworn service to the party and hopes to rescue the priests Yoin and Gorki. He tells you that he was severely beaten upon attempting escape shortly after capture and that his feet were smashed between rocks, leaving him crippled and with a 5 ft. movespeed until Regenerated or Healed.
Ashanarel - prissy half-elf who seems very demanding and rude
Kali Noodlin - Halfling of Lurabar (along with other 4 halflings) - traveling acting troupe. Their bard, Hickle Honeytongue, was separated from them upon reaching the city. They have requested that the party try to help him, but worry that they are unsuited to adventuring.
Topsy and Turvy - leaders of the captured Svirfneblin - depart soon after arriving in Neverlight Grove with thanks to the party for the rescue.
On the Way to Neverlight
A few hours after leaving the city, the party all staggers under the following mental intrusion:
(A horrific image swims in your mind of Zanticor’s alien face shorn of two of the tentacles, leaving behind only wriggling, bloody stumps)
Greetings wretches,
Know this: Your antics have become troublesome to my master, he has reminded me of the price of failure and wishes me to prove myself by destroying you and all you hold dear. Consider yourselves fortunate to receive his attention, it is a rare and precious gift for ones so weak.
Thanks to your pathetic half-breed slave, I now know all I need to do just that. How quickly he broke under my gentle caresses. Don’t worry Jobin, my friend, we will replace your failing devotion to a weak god with a much higher purpose.
Tomoe, too cowardly to wear your true form: your little tool was quite the surprise. I will grind it under my heel and you will enjoy swallowing the shards.
Cowl, you aspire to be great, but you are only a hairy worm, crawling through the muck. I regret that you won’t be able to hear the screams of those you swore to protect as I devour them.
Talon - you owe these fools nothing, what stake do you have in their unconscionable meddling? Stand aside when I come, join us willingly and you will be granted power beyond your comprehension. Power enough to slay he who hunts you…Defy me and I will rip that soul from your body and watch you writhe.
Oh Or’tree, deaf, but who knew just how dumb? What thanks we have to give to you! Who would have guessed that my master’s old foes were so close! I’m sure they would love to thank you personally for revealing their existence to us, but I’m afraid they won’t be around long enough. Perhaps my master will be kind enough to save one or two to kill you themselves after we are done with our fun…
And finally, you, Rogtar, the inspiring leader! You denied your heritage to take up arms in defense of a pile of worthless halflings. And what can you do now that I come for them? Nothing! Just pathetic, but how strong you could be as the leader of my own servants. Yes, I think that is just the future you deserve.
Goodbye for now my friends, know that soon I will have taken all those you have cared about, destroyed your works and homes, and that I am coming for you next.
Using their ring of sending, the party contacts their followers in Meowswitch and sends them off to gather their allies on the surface to defend Parlfray's keep. They also send some to warn Carmenarin's clan of Svirfneblin. Upon attempting to use the ring again the next day they receive no response.
After that bit of good news, the party encounters some environmental challenges including a section of Araumycos, Rogtar and the Svirfneblin twins fill the party in on what it is.
After Neverlight
Thanks to Sovereign Basidia's warning about Soverign Phylo's "pet" lurking in the tunnels to the south, the party is none-too-shocked to encounter an enormous corpse lotus which puts up quite the fight. It quickly grapples party members and waves them around like a slightly less deadly carnival swing ride. Sadly for the lotus, it only has four tendrils and can't squeeze the life out of the nabbed party members before Talon and Tomoe cut their way out of its, uh, plant stomach...area...thing. I should probably chock this one up to poor creature design, but hey, it did have Improved Bull-Rush and a 10 ft. speed, so that's something. Talon also stole Tomoe's dagger and left it in the plant remains, that ingrate.
The party rests afterward. Except Rogtar and Cowl, who try to rest, but are disturbed by nightmares. Despite her professed unfamiliarity with magic, Tomoe suggests using her wand of Keep Watch to the two exhausted spell-casters next time.
Upon reaching the surface and emerging from a cave high on a snowy mountainside, the party makes its FIRST EVER KNOWLEDGE GEOGRAPHY CHECK, WOO! and finds out they're some days travel south of Haranshire in the Cloud Peaks. When we left off, the party was debating whether to disturb a pair of beach-ball sized eggs found in a nest suitable for a Large or Huge creature at the mouth of the cave...
