The World of Telvar

The thief was agile enough to spring out of the trap without full damage,
but we were left with a small puzzle of crossing this trap. As it turned
out, the solution was simple. Standish sprang across as fast as he could
with a rope attached, and hammered a spike in on the other side, and the
rest of the party crossed safely.

Next we found a room with most of the floor gone, and bubbling black ooze
in the pit 40 feet below. Brigling swung across and nearly fell, but made
it to the other side. We all crossed again.

Finally, we came up against a weird hazelike door, or wall. With little
choice, Halacar decided to step through.

A huge sharp metal key swung violently over his head, at the perfect
height to decapitate a human, but ineffective against a two and a half
feet tall halfling. Brigling disarmed the trap and removed the key. We
were in a small room, containing only a small archway made out of various
blocks.

We tried to crawl through it, and nothing happened. We tried rearranging
the blocks. Finally we gave up and Browork decided to use a Detect Magic.
We discovered that only the top block was magical.

We tried a number of things with the key and block, to no avail. Finally
we decided to leave.

But when we got back to the reverse gravity area, there was a door there
instead of a corridor. In fact the door was in a different wall than the
way we had come in.

And the key fit into the door perfectly. The area began to shift into a
round room and we swiveled strangely, and came out into a different area
of the dungeon.

We quickly reached a balcony to the outside, a courtyard of some sort with
a raised gate. There was a switch to lower the portcullis beside the gate
itself, some 40 feet distant from the balcony.

We followed the stairs down back into the complex, and discovered two
other passages. In one we found a room with a number of crates... and two
kobolds! They attacked!

We skewered one, but the other ran for help down a small hole. Brigling
and Halacar leaped after it.

And ran into a half-dozen reinforcements. Halacar made quick work of them
and we charged through another hole after the last few kobolds...

And ran into the entire clan.

25 kobolds attacked Halacar who at first stood fast at the corridor in
front of Brigling. He slew the leader messily and the other kobolds
backed off... and Halacar leapt forward to continue the battle!

This of course exposed Brigling and Standish's dogs to attack. Cromwell
the war dog and Hinton (?) the guard dog leapt to Brigling's defense, and
she held them off, killing several. Halacar continued to wade through
kobolds, eventually slaying women and children as well.

With only four remaining, Brigling was forced to retreat, and they
followed her desperately, hoping for escape. Halacar skewered one from
behind. Brigling turned and stabbed one, then continued to run, leaving
only two.

Brigling sprang through the hole and one followed. The second crashed
into Browork's strategically placed shield.

Standish leaped on one and fell over, missing. He scrambled back up, and
Brigling was on it, killing it messily.

The last was trapped, and Browork tried to shield bash it, but fumbled and
the kobold slipped out... until Standish socked it, taking it out.

We tried to talk to it, but it was hopeless. Finally named it Crusher the
Kobold (to go with Slasher the Goblin) and sold it to the Arena in the
City, after we slipped out of the complex.

The kobold leader's armor was magical, which turned out to be chainmail +1
sized for a halfling, and so Halacar got it.

We also recovered a cloak +1, which Megan purchased with her money for
1750 gp. (Alex, if you object horribly, let us know)

Having done well, we decided to push our luck and explore the other
passage in that dungeon.

We headed into a domed room, huge in extent, and began to wander around
the outside of it. We then ran into to some sort of NASTY worm creature.

It immediately ate Standish whole, but he continued to stab it from the
inside. Halacar, Browork and Brigling pelted it as well, and we brought
it down through sheer force, with Halacar dodging its attacks (and getting
mighty lucky).

As we pulled Standish out of the wreckage of the worm, several arrows
struck the party. We pulled out of the lighted area (a failed Light spell
from Browork), and turned on infravision. We spotted four men with bows,
in metallic armor.

One ran off to the other end of the cave and vanished. The other three
advanced slowly on our position, and firing blindly in the dark at us.
They were obviously human.

We waited until the approached, and Browork Held one of them. The other
two suddenly opened Continual Light pouches and forced some of us to shut
our eyes momentarily. Then they shot up Browork and Standish. Halacar
was attempting to save the guard dog, who had been trashed in the worm
attack.

We closed and when forced into hand to hand combat, these guys weren't so
dangerous. Brigling backstabbed one, and even Browork clonked one a few
times, and Standish tore the other to shreds. Brigling sliced the Held
one's throat.

Unfortunately, Halacar was unable to save the guard dog.

We looted the bodies of gear, and then ran away when we noticed a troupe
of armored men coming for us, at least half a dozen.

Where to run? We decided to pull a cool trick on them, and ran up the
stairs to the trap area and switched the door so they couldn't follow (it
was possible to shift the door back and forth by picking up the key and
block which magically returned to the same spot after each attempt).

We spell-shifted for 4 hours and healed up a bit. Halacar and Brigling
were keeping watch from the courtyard, when they noticed a number of
bushes advancing on the open gate.

Uh oh.

We realized that we were trapped here, and that maybe our clever plan was
a little lacking, since it appeared our opponents knew this location.

Still, perhaps they didn't know we were here?

A voice boomed out, "Those who kill my men will pay in blood!"

So much for being hidden.

We decided at first to try a defense at the top of the stairs to the
balcony, and retreat over the pit.

This was made foolish when Halacar and Brigling, sitting haplessly on the
balcony and in the courtyard, were suddely nailed by an Ice Storm.

Halacar quickly shut the gate and made a run for the balcony. He downed
half a potion of climbing and sprang up the wall to the balcony, making it
inside with all haste. This turned out to be very good when some sort of
billowy cloud appeared where Halacar would have been had he simply run
normally.

We hid inside. There were noises. We realized that we were doomed.

Then a plan sprang to mind.

We looked outside, and discovered that they were taking the portcullis out
to let over 20 men inside, all in metallic armor. A crazy obvious wizard
type with red hair and robe packed with half moons, green clovers, purple
horseshoes, etc. was standing outside.

We set oil on the top of the stairs, ready to light, and stacked the
crates nearby to hinder movement.

We waited until the moment of distraction when the men all charged through
the broken gate.

Browork, who had downed the other half of the potion of climbing, dashed
up the wall and up the cliff face. Brigling, who had attached a rope in
secret up there, shimmied up, followed by Standish, the only non-climber
at the moment.

Poor Standish was of course visible, and they spotted him partway up,
shooting arrows at him and missing.

The wizard began a spell. Standish realized that he had to disrupt it,
and he dropped down to the balcony again and threw the Silence stone from
Browork at the wizard, messing him up!

(As this was a paralyzation spell, that was VERY GOOD)

Standish lit the top of the stairs on fire and climbed up once again. As
he crested the top, the wizard let a Lightning Bolt loose at us and it
glanced away from Halacar and Standish, who managed to avoid the worst of
it. The wizard yelled, "I never give up, I'll hunt you down!"

We all ran away down the cliffside, the troupe in hot pursuit about
10 minutes behind. Then, luck of luck...

... the dragon swooped down at us.

With a cry of frustration and terror, realizing that our escape was for
naught, the four of us searched for cover while the war dog ran into the
open on Standish's command, hopefully providing bait.

Suddenly we realized that we could reach the cave to the dungeon we had
just left! Boy, they wouldn't expect us to do something THAT stupid,
would they?

We shrugged and ran inside, jumping off the cliff 15 feet, landing and
dashing into a side room, beaten but alive, including the war dog
Cromwell.

Suddenly we heard the dragon leave. Waiting a few moments, Brigling went
to check it out...

The dragon was killing the men pursuing us!

We waited a few moments and then ran away back toward town.

We encountered so hobgoblins, and in our weakened state just decided to
run away. Which we did.

We arrived back in town, frightened but alive.

Standish and Halacar trained to 5th level, moving to 56 hp each.

Slasher the goblin (maybe I have the names switched?) had another fight,
this time against a hobgoblin. Halacar bet against him, Standish bet for
him, and somehow Slasher won anyway. And he won handily.

Crusher the Kobold faced off against a giant rat, and after a close
battle, he killed it!

We decided on a final foray to a completely different dungeon.

After discovering a few interesting links, including a direct path from
the outside to that elemental air thing that we chatted with on our first
adventure, and another to the shambling mound area, we found a new cave.

We explored this one, and found a small hole in the ceiling almost
immediately.

We climbed up and discovered that there were about 20 "bats" on the
ceiling. With a Silence spell, we realized they were stirges, and
Standish killed them all without a battle.

There were about 3000 gp on the floor of that room.

We continued forward and passed a huge number of passageways, and
proceeded along the right is wrong, south is Ralph so always go right
philosophy.

We found the body of an apparent wizard, with his skull bashed in. There
was no sign of what had killed him.

We put the body in the bag of holding.

This led us to a weird room with a natural column and a pool of water. We
decided to spell-shift at the entrance for a Detect Magic. This was not
to be.

As we passed by the first passage we had left unexplored, a small owlbear
came out and jumped at us.

It tried to engulf Browork, but failed, and we hacked at it desperately.
A light spell failed to blind it, but we were trouncing it when a SECOND
one appeared behind it, waiting to kill us.

Still we pressed on, and although the battle was close, we killed both
creatures. Behind them was some cool treasure.

One of the odd things about the owlbears was that they had collars that
appeared to be strangling them. On the collar it said, "Guardian of the
City. Do not attack."

There were a few stirges here, and they attacked us. We eliminated them
with minor cuts and bruises, just in time to face a hydra.

Yes, a hydra. Eight heads and all.

It came at Halacar primarily, and he battled four heads (incompetently)
while Standish turned into a wrecking machine (his sword is +3 vs.
reptiles, and this counted), and even Brigling shot down the creature
quite a bit.

Halacar was barely surviving with Browork hurling Cures at him
continuously, and it looked bad, but at last the heads were dying, and
Standish was bursting on Halacar's heads. Halacar and Brigling eliminated
one, and the heads made a grab for Halacar, bringing hm to his knees, but
still alive.

Then the creature finally collapsed under the weight of the blows we had
dealt it.

Breathing sighs of relief, we explored past it. There we discovered the
body of a gnome in full plate armor. He was apparently a member of the
Coral Star, the old adventuring party that had battled the wizard of
Wizard Mountain.

We also found a ton of treasure in a very well locked box that Brigling
nonetheless picked handily. We continued to check out passages until we
had eliminated all but a few, and then decided to head back to town for
some rest and research.

We brought the wizard's body back, and as it turned out, we had to gamble
on the speak with dead. The wizard council didnt trust that he was an
actual wizard, but rather someone dressed up like one. It turned out that
he was in fact a council member! And they gave us a nice big reward! And
he even owes us a small favor.

We identified the items and found we had full plate +1 with 42 hp!
Insane, and of course, it's halfling sized... so Halacar got it again.

We traded in the chainmail +1 for a dagger+2 and a potion of levitation,
which was a slight ripoff, but a necessary one for the party to have a
floating magic weapon of use.

We also picked up about 20,000 gp of treasure!

There were other items as well, that I can't remember. But we are on
quite financially stable ground now! Yay, Larry Consortium!

We set a 10% sort of salvage tax to be given to the consortium on
completion of a mission, so that the group would be benefitting some from
our expeditions as well.

Also, Brigling gained 6th level, and Browork gained 5th level, both moving
to 36 hp, so the party now looks like this:

Halacar, 5th level halfling fighter, 56 hp
Sandish, 5th level half-orc fighter, 56 hp
Brigling 6th level halfling thief, 36 hp
Browork, 5th level dwarven cleric, 36 hp

Pretty cool game! See you all again soon!

Joel