Run Date: February 14th, 2023
PCs
Rebel: Lv4 Monk
Richard: Lv3 Fighter
Malak: Lv2 Laurenian Priest
Hench x13
Wrapping Up the Blackwell Vault
Discussions went quick today. The players still want to take a break from the Oldtown Graveyard, but didn't want to leave the Blackwell Bank Vault unfinished. We covered some downtime prep (since they didn't send me anything last week) and started the delve.
As luck would have it, none of my restock rolls came up aces. Richard's player had also brought a dry erase board to sketch out their path and practice mapping; making the navigation a lot more straightforward (and keeping me from toying with the players again). The group descended down the mausoleum tunnel, onto the first landing, and through the fish room and jello door. Once inside Blackwall's cavern, Richard took the lead to try and navigate back to the bank. Unfortunately, he got lost on the way through the side alleys he'd traveled through last time.
As the party turned a corner, they stumbled onto a tiny park entrance; and within it was a squad of mutated, albino humanoids. Both groups startled each other and immediately engaged. Richard lead his barbarian crew in a charge against the creatures' frontline and they cut down half of the mob. The creatures' morale held, however, as a gurgled bark came from the shadows. As the monsters retaliated, more came from the shadows just beyond the edge of the group's torchlight. Among them were 3 bodyguards and a shaman, all wielding wrought iron fence posts as spears (and a staff).
The Shaman dropped a spell into the swirling melee, forcing on of the party's henches to flee into the darkness (forever). Meanwhile, the rest hacked and cut. Another henchmen received a crippling blow that destroyed an eye and the lines stabilized. The party's backline tried to offer some support fire, but that only resulted in someone taking a rock to the back of the head.
The next round, the barbarian crew continued their raging assault and Rebel used the opportunity to punch a hole to the Shaman and drop him. Without their leader, the remaining creatures attempted to flee. The party had no interest in letting them live. With the fight wrapped up, the party patched up the hench who'd lost an eye and checked their own wounds. They decided not to risk chasing down their fleeing hench, and his voice eventually vanished. As for treasure, there wasn't much on the bodies but some shillings; though Rebel found that the shaman's staff's head held an interesting trinket: a small crystalline covered shell with a hermit crab inside. I think she decided to call him Herman.
Rebel took the lead navigating through the streets and had better luck. The group found a main road that joined the Bank's; and ahead of them, same as last week, there were lights. Rebel broke from the group and used the cover of darkness to sneak toward the window. She peeked in for a quick head count then recruited Richard to join in surprise assault. Despite his heavy armor, Richard had no issues readying for the ambush. 3...2...1... Rebel and Richard threw some Slimekiller Solvent into the room where sinew-mounted, flame-filled sludge monsters were patrolling. They dropped all but two of the creatures in their ambush, leaving behind a monstrosity and its much larger boss.
The massive sludgezerker rushed through bank and toward the window where the pair were hiding, and proceeded to wail on them. Rebel and Richard weathered blow after blow while the rest of the party rushed to engage. The party let fly a volley of ranged attacks while charging to close the gap. Unfortunately, while the hits struck hard, they also opened a new can of worms: each heavy blow caused a localized explosion. The pair at the window managed to evade much of the damage, but between waves of molten sludge, fire, and stone-like blows, they were quickly wearing down.
Another round of strikes came down from the Sludgezerker, and Richard would have dropped had Rebel not shattered another vial of Slimekiller Solvent as a Rescue. The party landed several more heavy blows, finally killing the creature; but leaving their friends deeply wounded. As the massive monstrosity dissolved away, the final creature turned the corner. It died quickly, and thankfully was far weaker than its larger counterpart.
The crew dragged themselves into the vault to patch up and take a breather before continuing further into the vault. Here again, no restocks. Richard handled mapping while the group set up their marching order, and down they went. Their first stop was along the old path as they tried to remember which direction was which. The players caught on quick to the areas they'd visited and swapped direction. They quickly found the barred door from last session and ignored it. At the end of the long hall, they found a sludge door, and immediately tossed another Solvent.
As the door dissolved, a bright and beautiful beam of light issued forth. A shaft awaited the party; above them was a vault, and below them a Boneheart and web of sludge. The group tossed another vial of Solvent at the heart to clear out some webbing and Rebel headed down with Richard, Vance, and another henchmen. The group resisted any ill effects from crawling through the sludge and began striking at the heart. With no more defenses (or encounters or restocks), the group made quick work of the heart and retrieved the glowing shard. The ground quaked as the Black Death shuddered again, though not quite enough to collapse the Vault.
Having retrieved their prize and seeing now immediate threats, the party split their group and started raiding the vaults above and below. Among the items, the party found several bits of valuable jewelry, a white leather vest studded with bloodstones, several cases containing scrolls, a pint of an unknown potion (and tourmaline ribbons), and a smattering of coin in chests, sacks, and purses. "We got a haul, let's get the hell out."
The party managed to navigate their way out and didn't run into anymore encounters, and the rest of the session was spent with me being bad at math (and explaining just what the party found). Given the rewards, we'll have a lot of characters out Training for the next couple weeks.
Rewards
16 XP (the highest single session return so far)
Vampiric Studded Leather (Bloodstones)
Scroll of Feywalker's Drift
Scroll of Strange Joining
Scroll of Phasement to Nowhere
Potion of Flying (I forget the Deluxe name)
PCs: 156gp, 2sh, 1p
Hench: 23gp
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