Session 107 Report: Hunting the orbs part 2

General Summary

Session 107 – Wednesday January 8th, 2025: Hunting Down the orbs Part 2

4-hour Battle/Exploration/puzzle session 5:30 PM to 10:00 PM.

The Stone Bearers. Party of 5:

It is the 5th day of the month of Ches (The Claw of Sunset) in the 51st year of the Age of Enialis (Late March.)

• Ajani– High Elf, L20 Wizard – Nathan Gioconda
• Cassidy – Human, L20 Blood hunter – Ryan Armstrong (Remote)
• Gazlowe – Goblin, L20+ Artificer – Josh Pozsonyi (Absent - In Japan)
• Isabella – Forest Gnome, L20 Barbarian – Jackie Armstrong
• Juan Peyote – Gnome L20 Paladin – Will Johnson
• Seften Mitcaver – Human, L120 Cleric – Jacob Munson

The path to Bel

With Gazlowe running to the Far East from the slayer, the rest of the party followed Zorguk the demon, towards the next orb to be destroyed guarded by the presiding general of Avernus, the former ruler of Avernus, The Devil Lord Bel. As they traveled through the dungeon, Zorguk vouched for the Stone Bearers but without Gazlowe, the other demons seemed to grow suspicious of the party. After about an hour they came to a massive stone door that appeared to have no obvious way to open. Upon the door was a poem and three small indentations where a liquid could be placed. The party cleverly deciphered the clues in the poem and was able to bypass the traps and open the door.   The door opened and the party entered. They spotted a broken statue and a glowing crown. After searching for traps, Ajani took the crown and identified it as a “Crown of Glowing” granting him advantage on perception checks within the 15’ of the crown’s bright (slightly purple) light. The party agreed that it made him look quite kingly.

Nagpa.

As the party ventured deeper, they encountered 2 scraggly looking Nagpa talking near a large statue. The Nagpa warned the party to go back. Cassidy insulted the Nagpa insisting they’ll only talk with Bel. The Nagpa became enraged and began to cast a spell. Ajani and Seften both realized the whole area was a wild magic zone.   The wild magic caused the Nagpa to appear more attractive but had no other real effect. The Nagpa tried to cast feeble mind on Cassidy, but she resisted. Seften cast Command to make them grovel, the wild magic gave him advantage on persuading people wearing white, but the suggestion itself failed. The statue came to life and punched the heck out of Cassidy leaving her bloodied. Juan mounted bird and flew towards the Nagpa. As he got closer, he saw an undead beholder (Death Tyrant) lurking behind the Nagpa. Juan and Bird attacked the attractive Nagpa and landed a critical blow along with a Smite. The wild magic made Juan silent. The 2nd Nagpa tried to paralyze everyone but only Bird and Isabella succumbed to it. It then tried to disintegrate Cassidy but failed.   Ajani tried to banish the Nagpa, but they resisted, and the wild magic caused a swarm of Gnats to fly around Ajani’s head. Isabella shook off the paralysis. The death tyrant hit Juan with an Enervation ray of necrotic energy. The party continued to dodge the Nagpa’s spells. Seften cast a guardian of faith that looked like Snuffelsnort and dealt damage to the enemies for the next couple rounds. Juan landed a couple more blows leaving the first Nagpa in bad shape. Cassidy then pushed the Nagpa into a lava pit where it burst into flames and was killed. Ajani hit the statue with a lightning strike and Cassidy removed its resistance. Isabella slashed the Death Tyrant. The Death Tyrant put Isabella to sleep. The statute slammed Seften hard. It then went to hit Ajani, but Ajani’s mage armor protected him.   Bird Licked Isabella and woke her up. Juan attacked the remaining Nagpa. Cassidy hit the Nagpa with chill touch and the wild magic made everyone in the area vulnerable to psychic damage. The Nagpa charmed Seften who now considered him a friendly acquaintance. Ajani hit the statue with a fireball. The wild magic caused Ajani’s skin to become a shade lighter. Isabella sliced into the bloody Nagpa with her axe. Cassidy got hit by a necrotic ray from the Death Tyrant leaving her near death. The Death Tyrant pushed Seften into the lava pit but Seften was immune to the lava. The Death Tyrant slowed Juan.   The statue slammed Ajani again and left him badly bloodied. Juan hit the Nagpa and nearly killed it. Cassidy used her blood magic to remove the charm from Seften and cause psychic damage to the Nagpa. Being vulnerable to psychic damage, the Nagpa nearly killed, but using the trait also knocked Cassidy temporarily unconscious. Her rights ended and she woke up with 1 HP. Cassidy finished it off with a chill touch. With the Nagpa dead, the Statue became inert. The party focused on the Death Tyrant and Ajani finished it off with a chromatic orb.

Despite all my rage I’m still just a frog in a cage.

Seften said a pray of Healing and granted the party a short rest along with some healing. Cassidy searched the area and found a +3 shield. Seften took the shield, and Cassidy collected the Nagpa skull. The party moved on. Further into the dungeon they spotted a small brass cage with a colorful frog sitting inside. A sign over the cage read “Kiss me.” Isabella opened the cage and immediately took poison damage. She began to shrink and turn green and after a moment she was polymorphed into a frog. Seften turned to Ajani and said, “Well, I’m not going to kiss her.” As a frog Isabella kissed the frog in the cage and returned to her normal self. They closed the cage with a stick and moved on.

A Gauntlet in an anti-magic hall.

They came to a hall that was filled with swinging axes, spears, scimitars, clubs and hammers. Ajani sensed that his magic was useless in this area. At the far end of the hall was a mound of bodies with some sort of cloud over it. Cassidy sneezed and Ajani disappeared. The party noticed that the hall consisted of a long walkway with ledges on either side that dropped to pools of lava. They knew that if they got hit, they could easily be knocked off the ledge and into the lava.   Seften was able to throw some lava onto the first swinging axe and burned the wooden handle. After a few minutes the axe was destroyed. Isabella hopped on top of Seften’s shoulders and tried to destroy the 2nd axe but her the axe got caught and it pulled her and Seften into the swinging blade. Only Isabell’s incredible strength kept her and Seften from being knocked into the lava. Both however took significant slashing damage.   The party contemplated the situation. Seften offered the idea of creating a stone shield shaped like a canoe that they could hold over their heads. They saw that the end was large hammers that would most likely smash the stone protection. They decided to use the stone protection to get past the swinging blades and then try to shoot rabbit glue up into the swinging mechanisms of hammers.   The plan was successful. The party worked together as Seften led the construction of the stone canoe shield thing. Isabella was able to help extract large stones from the cave. Cassidy helped to identify the most likely stones. Juan chewed on the stones to get them to the proper size. With the shield over their heads the axes and spears and other swinging blades smashed against the canoe and were destroyed.   They approached the hammers, Cassidy attached glue vials to arrows and shot them up into the mechanism of the swinging hammers. She needed to use 4 of 5 vials but the glue produced the desired effect.

Death flies.

At the end of the hall (and still in the anti-magic field) they saw what the mound was. It was a pile of dead adventures. It appeared as if they were previous adventurers who made it through the gauntlet and died here. The cloud over the bodies was a cloud of flies. Upon closer examination the flies seemed to be feasting on the flesh of bodies.   Isabella proposed the use the canoe as a bridge and lay it down over the bodies. Cassidy used the bag of holding (currently empty in the anti-magic zone) and with amazing dexterity caught 30 flies without disturbing the swarm. The party then raised the stone bridge up vertically and then pushed it down onto the dead bodies and the gargantuan swarm of death flies.

Rewards Granted

Treasure

• A Crown of Glowing
[loi]+ 3 shield.