Nerd Pride Radio

A recap of last night's session for Illian, and an update for Anna, who left early...

First off: LEVEL UP!!! Yes, even the dead and missing get to level up, based on what DMDarcs indicated at the end of last night's session (correct me if I'm wrong!)!

When we last left our intrepid adventurers, they were facing off against a lich hiding behind what turned out to be a wall of force. Anna was able to disintegrate that wall of force, after which we were able to attack the lich. Unfortunately, the lich cast a prismatic spray spell, with devastating effects! Anna was killed by a poison, Sam was sent back to the prime material plane, on the lakeshore outside Runeforge, and several others were injured (I know at least Eldthor was). But the next round, Hal and Dwyn were able to beat the bastard to oblivion. But we were left in a panic about the death of Anna and the disappearance of Sam!

First, we put one of the amulets of preservation on Anna, to preserve her corpse for future raising, and looted the lich's body. Then we searched the room, wanting to find the lich's phylactery. We found a trap door in the floor that led to another chamber that contained three sarcophagi. When we opened the first one, there was an explosion of noise and negative energy that damaged Hal and Thor (the only ones in the room at the time). In the first one, we found a number of spell books that we are saving for Anna to review. In the second, we found a lot of treasure. And the third was better-crafted, but empty, and Dothan says it's actually the lich's phylactery (portability isn't a concern, since it was bound to Runeforge anyways).

Hal then used the quill to locate Sam and find out how to reunite with her (we need to find the exit), and to see if there was a way for us to revive Anna. Good news: There is! We have a limited wish scroll that we can use to bring Anna back to life, albeit with a few negative levels. But once we are able to reunite with Sam, she'll be able to cast restoration and restore those negative levels!

At the end of this session, we are left with wanting Dwyn to destroy the lich's phylactery (she finally gets to smash something evil!!!), after which we'll finish looting this hall, return to the Runeforge central fountain, raise Anna, forge our weapons, rest, and then finish searching the last hall for the exit from Runeforge, so we can reunite with Sam!

For level 13, I added another level of ranger, and added the shaping focus feat, which treats me as a druid 4 levels higher for purposes of my shapeshifting abilities. That means I can now shift into any animal from Diminutive to Huge in size, a small or medium elemental, or a small or medium plant creature.

At some point on Thursday night I was laying there in front of the computer and passed out, during the game. I woke up in the wee hours of the morning with all the lights still on and the computer sitting there, and one of the kids had crawled into the other side of the bed. Last night was the same - I actually had this reply box open so I could talk about passing out the night before, when I passed out cold again with the lights on and slept until early AM. Awful. I was all dehydrated and had terrible dreams about the insect world.

The point is, yes, I will smash whatever you've got there! We will save Anna. Whew!!!!!

And now that Thor can shapeshift into huge animals, he could always shift into and elephant and try to batter the thing to pieces.

A. Elephant does not fit in sarcophagus room. Sadly.

B. Lucille does more damage than an elephant's trample attack.

I know. But when you have a new sledgehammer, you want to pound some nails.

Oh no kidding. I got a little excited myself when you started listing all your potential new forms.

Taking just another level of paladin seems anticlimactic...likeliest course of action however. Suggestions for feat welcome...thought about the one where Hal could get other class spells, like true shot, but nearly all of them (true shot included) take a round to cast and therefore delay engagement. Quick engagement seems to have been an asset lately, so not sure that would be particularly useful.

My goodness, I finally woke up enough to realize that I get to add a level!!!!! And I think this time it's a double feat level.

For real we need to talk about whether wearing a headband of vast intelligence would actually allow me to take feats that require combat expertise. If I lost my crown or it broke, then I wouldn't be able to use those abilities, but it sure would be nice to have then most of the time. It would also be interesting from the role-play perspective.

Illian. You should take the golembane scarab. It allows you to bypass DR on golems. Very situational, but very powerful when it comes up.

Concur, it might be just in the runeforge, but we've met a dozen golems...they're easy muscle for wizards, so I expect to keep meeting them. Hal's smite bypasses DR also, but I think that's only if they're evil.

Don't know what Darcs decided on your prestige class, but both of us have expanded crit skills, maybe something about if one crits..the other is more likely? If that's too much, maybe a save boost? or possibly using Hal for partial cover...just spitballing.

Once we revive Anna, we do need to see about getting a message to Sam letting her know we’re on our way back to get her.

Excellent. We'll use Sending! Our cleric should have... oh.

No wait! It's a wizard spell too! 25 words out. She gives us 25 words back. We get close and then someone casts Locate Sam, and we're done!

Even better. If one or the other can find a way to get Anna a vivid image of the area, Anna could port in and port back.

A little uncertain about porting in and out of runeforge. Plane shift...nevertheless, sending is a great idea. We should ask questions about the phylactery...to confirm its destruction, the exit from here.....two more questions.
I'm not happy about leaving the wrath folks behind. I think they'll eventually find the exit we find, and I'm existentially uncomfortable about loosing them on an unsuspecting world. Not to mention there may be a wrath sponsor (Karzoug's equivalent) they could raise, but we can have that discussion later. Right now, short handed without Sam, I'm thinking we may have to leave tasks undone unless we can solidify a return plan to mop up and close the place for good.

Oh no. We have to get out of Runeforge first. I was assuming that.

Getting an image to Anna shouldnt be an issue. Once revivified, she will remember the shores of the lake and the stone heads without an issue.

The real problem is going to be that we can't teleport to Sam. The wording on Teleport is very specific, in that interplanar travel is not possible. Anna would need to know 7th level spells to cast Plane Shift, and isn't capable of that yet.

It's worth noting that Plane Shift is a 5th level cleric spell, so its possible that Sam could rest, pray for Plane Shift, and then shift back to us, rather than us shifting to her.

I dont know what other 6th level spells Anna is picking up, but she is taking Spell Penetration for her feat at level 13. As for her new arcanist exploit, she's undecided... there are a few possibilities:

Convert Wand - for 1 minute, change any wand that she is currently holding into a cure wand of equal level... kind of interesting, but with the healing we have with us, perhaps unneccessary
Spell Leech - draw spells that were successfully counterspelled into her mind, potentially copying them into her spellbook if unknown... this is potentially busted, but would require a LOT of counterspelling... we saw how well THAT worked last week...

I dont have my character sheet to hand, so I dont actually remember the other exploits she has... there might be a couple other possibles.