I had cautioned the group some time ago that not every encounter has to be faced head on like a band saw - the option to flee is always there. Thankfully, they've been taking advantage of this more as the years have gone on, and this meeting was no exception. The K'Morat are retreating in places during the fight, why shouldn't the party?
Yes there is a Frost Giant in the area, and yes, it come when the Shaman calls. No one is saying the group has to fight it, not at 2nd/3rd level. They'll have to be smarter in the future.
Write up follows:
The hall ended and turned to the right and Barb motioned the group to be silent as she crept closer to listen; hearing the faint creak of wood on stone and wood on wood. She guessed the K’Morat were there and they were ready for us. Letting the party know, the group then decided to set up the area behind them.
As the cross corridor, Darius laid out a thin sprinkling of caltrops, covering the floor in question down the south side, and then laid a layer of flour at the crossing to track any K’Morat tracks. He then rejoined Barba at the front and the party drew themselves up for combat.
Wicking and then lighting a flask of oil, Darius hurled it into the hall and room where the K’Morat had positioned a number of tables to act as barriers against the party. The oil hit the ceiling and rained fire down on the kobolds below as the ones in the front hurled their javelins and they clattered against Barba and Darius. Connal was right behind, spear at the ready; everyone hunched down in the narrow passage as Barb hit the first barrier and tried to knock it away.
It was braced from the other side; the half-orc rocked back but couldn’t get through. Javelins were bouncing about, scratching and blasting against her; enough so that she snarled, twisted her head, and raged. Her armor stretched, the sinews burst, and she pushed her way through the mess of tables, kicking the kobolds in her way aside. Connal took up position at the doorway while Darius slung a U-bolt into the room and took of another K’Morat’s skull.
Meanwhile from the other side, Negan heard K’Morat closing down the passage from the north and he swapped his shields, turned and started turtling his way back down the passage towards the rest of the group, shoving Avulstein ahead of him. He dropped his own bag of caltrops on the floor and made it around the corner as the K’Morat drew closer and continued to chirp and snarl.
In the main room a number of the K’Morat turned to run, fleeing down a narrow western passage, leaving many of the remaining one behind. Barb impaled one on her spear and then shook it off before accosting the next. Avulstein sent Centius back to ward the passage with Negan who loaded up his own flask of oil and tossed the lit mess back down the passage. Two of the K’Morat were screaming their heads off while others tried to storm forward, only one getting through the layer of caltrops. He was assaulted instantly, hacked apart and left to die while the K’Morat began to break.
With only a few left, Darius ran back towards Negan to help, leaving Barb to slam her spear into one of the fleeing lizard men, tossing him back into the fray, and Connal finishing off the one he was fighting. The Half-orc buried her spear in the one kobold and then started to come down from her rage high. As for the last two near Negan, one was killed with a spear in the face and the last tried running south, hit the caltrops we had placed there, fell on them, and dragged himself forward until he died.
We policed the bodies, dragging them into what was once the K’Morat quarters, knocking the tables away from their bracing and then hacking the ears off them for proof of collection. We blocked the corridor we had come down by taking one of the tables, running at the passage, and then lifting the table vertical at the last moment; jamming it in place so hard it didn’t shake free. Two bracing bars and some stuffed bodies (compliments of Negan) went towards filling in the gaps.
As for the other passage to the west, it was perhaps 30’ and turned south – narrow, dark, and we didn’t trust it. So after a light stone verified what we knew – we decided to jam that passage up as well with another table. From here we then left the room out the north and east passage that we had verified joined back up with the main corridor that we had come in. But we did the table trick again, this time backwards and in our direction – making it difficult as hell for anyone to come this way or get behind us.
We stayed in tight formation, Barb leading the way, arriving back at the cross corridor. We snagged the ears from the last K’Morat who had died here beyond the caltrops, and continued on. It was some 30 odd paces and then a turn to the right. The corridor here was still just over 5’ tall and sloped down at a 15 degree angle. Plus there was the smell of rotting for and feces making us gag as we walked.
We descended the slope for some 25, 30 feet until it leveled out – passage continued ahead eventually opening to some chamber, side passage to the right just at the base of the slope. Floor has about ¾ of an inch of filth on it, making it a bit slippery. Barb looked down the side passage – 20’? Turned to the right – just as foul. Guess was it was a midden.
She went to step ahead when her boot came in contact with a wire. Stretched across the hall, affixed on the left – going into a hole on the right. She pulled her boot back and we all backed down (up?) the passage and discussed our options. We wanted to keep going and decided to trip the wire from a distance with a grappling hook. We had to toss it a few times past and over the wire until it was set and then…we pulled!
Just a *PLINK* - nothing else. Maybe a gurgling noise? We backed away again and after some time decided it was safe to go on. So Barb once more took lead and as we were all travelling to the side passage and the wire, the ground below Barb fell away and she plummeted 9’ down to a pit filled with a foot or so of liquid filth and dozens of sharpened sticks. Although she hit a few of them, one punched through her armor and went into her right thigh. She was moaning and looking for some help out of the pit when coming from the long corridor and hitting those still up at the top with some atlatl thrown javelins.
Barb tossed her rope up and it was passed back to Negan but from the side passage MORE javelins were flying and the group was whittling hit points. As we helped Barb to the top she took two hits in the back as we ran up the slope and around the corner. A couple of quick healing draughts went and we were discussing our options when something was tossed UP the slope and landed with a wet thud by us.
Negan was yelling “Go! Go! Go!” barrel rushing everyone towards the entrance, not waiting to see what it was that was thrown our way. We hit the cross corridor and then each of us pulled our way up the steep slope to the surface. Barba was directing everyone to another fallen tree across the meadow while Darius was waiting for Negan (the last) to slide himself out of the warren. As he was trying to untie the silk rope he heard noises below, so it was a quick cut and then ran like mad across the meadow to dive behind the tree with the rest of the group.
We waited only a few minutes as the K’Morat came out, spears at the ready. First it was two, then 5, then a dozen. Our faces fell as the warren continued to empty – the K’Morat positioning themselves in a circular pattern around the entrance, layers deep. Eventually after perhaps 40 or more emerged, the last few fairly well armored and one of them covered in fetishes and markings, we realized that this was quite a bit for us to chew off.
The shaman type called out some words and pointed his hands to the sky. Three globes of light flew up, higher and higher, until over the tree tops they blossomed yellow, blue, and red. Satisfied, the shaman then retreated back down the hole and the other K’Morat did the same. We were growing uneasy and decided the lights (still there) might be a signal or beacon, so we left the safety of the tree, ran across the meadow, and started making our way north and east, getting clear of the place.
It was good that we did so because striding quickly from the south and west was a 14’ tall or so blue skinned armored and bearded giant with a double bitted axe, making a bee line towards the K’Morat warren. We doubled our speed and moved on. As we went, Barb was slowing down; her injuries and other problem were getting worse. We crested the ridge and eventually made it to the stone house on the shore of the mountain lake.
Barb was now burning up, the foulness from the pit making her sick and it wasn’t getting better. A few of us went out for birch bark while Darius brewed it into a tea using an old pepper tin as a cup. We washed her wounds as best as we could and decision was to stay here for the night and head off to base camp tomorrow.
We slept and the next day it was like a flood out there. Lightning and thunder, rain was coming down in buckets, and Barb was worse, coughing ragged lungfuls of air as she tried to get it under control. We made a carrying travois for her out of parts of the couch, rope, and a blanket, positioning her on top while Negan and Darius carried her out and into the rain.
It sucked, and it took us almost 6 hours to navigate our way around Furtham’s Peak and back to the Enderlyn River, following the flow back to Base Camp. We were let in, complained that the Giant Killers weren’t doing their fucking job, headed off complaints from the Bailiff that we hadn’t finished up the Warren, and then opted to see Spunifer of the Randari Rangers to see if she had some way of alleviating Barb’s now almost chronic illness.
Spunifer wanted some servitude from Barb who refused which infuriated the druid. She claimed that honor to the clan was more important than her own wants; called Barb an honorless cur and left her to her own devices. We talked about going to the alchemist’s next and seeing if they had something that would help.
No comments:
Post a Comment