Quick Recap: The party attended funeral services for the fallen hirelings and did not hire anyone new to replace them. They did ask Black Jay if he was interested, but the reaction roll was a definite NO. So they returned to the dungeon after getting XP and splitting treasure (Elmo and Spugnoir are now full members of the party with treasure shares). They got back to the ogre chamber to find the huge corpse STILL being eaten by giant rats. They easily slew the creatures then opened the secret door to find a small room and winding stairway beyond. The stair led up to the ruins and they located another secret door on the east wall. Before they could find out how to open it, an ogre opened it for them, got surprised by the party, and then slain with a single blow by Gort! The ogre fell dead down the stairs into the darkness.
ROSTER
- Elana Barzan, 3rd level human female cleric of Pelor, NG (hp 16)
- Gort Martin, 2nd/1st level half-orc male cleric/fighter of Wee Jas, LN (hp 19)
- Trixalix, 1st/1st level gnome male fighter/illusionist, N (hp 3)
- Elmo (NPC), 4th level human male ranger, LG (hp 41)
- Spugnoir (NPC), 2nd level human male magic-user (hp 4)
- Kevin, hireling linkboy (hp 4)
- Mort, Gort's trained hunting dog
Initially the party could only see some of the bugbears. Elana cast her bless spell on the first round as the bugbears closed for combat (and those in the back readied javelins). On round 2 Spugnoir cast a sleep spell but could only affect 2 bugbears in the rear. We learned, after reading the spell description, that hold person does not work on bugbears!! This was news to me! While the fighters in the front line attacked the bugbears who advanced, Elana got ready for melee and Trix climbed on the back of the mule for a better vantage. One of the bugbears skewered Spugnoir with a javelin and he fell to the floor, dying (-2 hp). Trix started shooting arrows from the back of the mule (he has a 17 Dex after all) while the fighters kept swinging away at the bugbears. Elana dropped her weapon and shield to tend to Spugnoir. She then cast cure light wounds on Spugnoir (back to full hp but he would be comatose for six turns thereafter). Trix exhausted his magic arrows trying to hit bugbears but only connected once. Elana dragged the unconscious Spugnoir off to the side away from combat view. Trix leapt off the mule and switched weapons to his sword and shield. One of the rear bugbears disengaged after seeing his comrades slain; he withdrew to the rear of the room and awaited death (failed morale but not by much). The last conscious bugbear advanced and was slain by Gort. At this point Gort healed himself with cure light wounds while the others advanced into the room. Elmo and Trix slew the two sleeping bugbears, which did nothing to improve the morale of the last bugbear. Elmo charged this bugbear and was struck in return for max damage (8 points!). Trix also advanced and missed the bugbear. Gort later moved in to help. After several rounds of the party continuously missing, Elmo managed to kill the final bugbear.
The whole melee lasted 13 rounds (and luckily no random encounters occurred during the battle). Trixalix was unable to recover any of his magic arrows (and now has no magic items). The party looted the bodies of the bugbears and did manage to find a total of 72 gp and a silver necklace set with chrysoprase gems worth 450 gp! (SIDE NOTE: since the party has a gnome with them, I let them know the value of the gems and jewelry they find.) Trix then started to search the rest of the room for treasure while Gort searched the north wall for secret doors (found none). Elana cast light on her mace and stayed with Spugnoir in the outer chamber because Kevin moved in to light the room for the searchers. Gort carried the treasure until it could be placed on the mule.
The party moved back to the southern chamber and Trix listened at the northern door (heard nothing). After two attempts Elmo opened the door and revealed an empty cubicle. The party then moved to the middle door and repeated the process. This time Gort opened the door and the party heard a clang as a trap is sprung. There was a blank wall behind the door and a chain leading from the door into a hole in the wall (the door released a mechanism that allowed a portcullis to slam down in the corridor by the stairs out, trapping the party in the lower dungeons, but they did not yet know this). Curious, Trix searched the north cubicle and the bugbear room to see if anything happened, but he found nothing. Shrugging, they moved to the south door and found that it concealed only another 10' empty cubicle. The party searched in the cubicles for secret doors but found none.
Spugnoir eventually recovered consciousness but was too weak to do anything but move with help. They had him lean on the mule for support as they headed back to the stairs.... only to find their way blocked by the portcullis! Unable to escape, they followed the corridor southwards and into a chamber that looked very similar to the one they just left. When they entered the chamber, the light from the lantern revealed some gnolls down the open corridor to the west. The party had achieved surprise on the creatures and they immediately began to re-organize for combat. Gort began casting his bless spell during the surprise segment, and since the special boon of clerics of Wee Jas is a casting reduction of 2 segments, his spell would come off in the first round after 7 more segments of casting (1 full round normal casting time). The others began readying spells of their own as Elmo braced for a gnoll advance. The gnolls began to emerge from the dark room - and there were more than the party first saw! Several advanced with battle axes while 4 remained behind (2 of those arming themselves with great bows). Trixalix used his dancing lights spell to illuminate the gnoll room, showing the party exactly what they faced. Elana was thus able to cast her hold person spell at the gnoll archers (but was only able to affect one; the other rolled a 19 saving throw). The advancing gnolls were met by Gort, Elmo, and Mort. The next round, Elana cast another hold person spell, and this time she was able to affect 3 gnolls in the front ranks (thankfully, since Gort and Mort were being abused by them). The held gnolls were slain by Gort and Elmo while Elana, Trix, and Kevin dove for cover from the last gnoll archer. After slaying the gnolls in the front, Gort and Elmo moved in for the others. The gnolls tried to fight but the fighters were too much for them (especially the ranger who was doing 1d8+8 points per swing). The final gnoll failed morale and dropped his weapon, raised his paws, and made whimpering noises.
It was late, so we ended the session here with most of the gnolls dead (except for the one who surrendered).
* * * * *
This turned out to be another frustrating night for the party. My dice were rolling really weird results and they kept missing most of their attacks. When they did manage to hit, though, they were doing great damage! Everyone participated to the fullest extent, and I even got Trixalix to finally use his dancing lights spell!
The party is becoming overly concerned with mortality again. I can see them becoming attached to the characters like they are with their regular characters in my normal campaign. I'm not sure this is a good thing. One of the reasons I wanted to run these one-shots was to let the players loosen up a bit and not be too concerned about losing characters. They HATE having a character fall - mainly I guess they just want to participate. But given the reaction when one of the main characters dies in the main campaign, I think they are seeing it as some great failure on their part. We haven't lost a PC yet, but the finale is coming up and there is likely to be at least one fatality in the group by then.
Searching for secret doors without an elf is ridiculously hard. We did a little research and it seems that a detect invisibility spell will locate a secret door! This is something that never occurred to me in all my years of gaming. The gnome has this as one of his starting spells and will likely memorize it for the next day.
The party is running out of resources and have taken a lot of hits. Mort, Gort, and Elmo are all below half their starting hp. Elana is injured but not by much. They have nowhere else to go but forward and Spugnoir is of no help anymore.
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