We finished Baba Yaga, skipped a week, and then played again tonight. I think next week will be the final session.
Final part of Baba Yaga:
Short Version: They fought a DCC RPG hydra, which was very deadly. I handed out treasure from the Pathfinder Reign of Winter path, which is awesome and all about Baba Yaga. There was a lot of hijinks with a cursed berserking sword. A PC ended up flying into a rift into the astral plane, with the sword, perhaps never to be seen again. They battled the double and won...
Long Version:
http://thecampaign20xx.blogspot.com/201 ... ursed.html
Tonight we began the endgame to my campaign. Baba Yaga gave the heroes her hut (the ad&D 1e version of it, touched up with stats from the 1e adventure in dragon magazine) on the condition that they kill Noohl from the Court of Chaos (from "Intrigue at the Court of Chaos"). The Court has been hounding the PCs since that adventure, trying to get their hands on the Balance Blade, which can sway the balance between law and chaos. With each chaotic soul slain, the more control Law has. I also have the sword charging up with a power that can change a section of land into a lawful place like the plane of law. The player with the balance blade has it all charged up but hasn't expended it yet.
So tonight's game was all about handing my players the keys, so to speak. They have their mission, I had prepared notes on the Court, and it's up to them to proceed. I created an island for each member of the court to live on in the sea of blood from "Intrigue", I used material from the dungeon dozen blog to flesh out each island.
My thinking was that the PCs could try to recruit another member of the court to betray Noohl. I wrote up motivations for each member of the court. The PCs could also call on Lexaliah and the Scions of Law for help, too. Further, I figured they could plunge the charged-up sword into Noohl to destroy him - they'd just need to figure out a way to get close to him.
Welp, here's what happened:
- The PCs went to Hekanhodah's island, to kill him and use his magic items to defeat Noohl. Hekanhodah pummeled the party with magic missiles. The party surrendered. Hekanhodah demanded the Balance Blade, and the fighter plunged it into Hekanhodah, expending the law charge and stripping away all of Hekanhodah's corruption and pretty much reducing him to a feeble old man.
- The heroes then fled to the hut, arguing about what to do next. They'd stolen Hekanhodah's spell book and the Staff of Ekim (+6 to spell checks!). Long story short, Magog found out the PCs were on the isle, and offered to help them against Noohl if they handed over the balance blade. The fighter, who is lawful, refused. Magog vanished, and told Noohl everything. Noohl ordered a fleet of his ships to sail to hekanhodah's island...
- Meanwhile, our heroes remain in the hut on hekanhodah's island as imminent doom approaches. They argue about what to do next. The guy who was taught to drive the hut points out that the court wants the balance blade and the evil party wizard most of all (she has a long history with the court). Evil party wizard takes great offense to the idea of being handed over to the court, and casts magic missile on the hut driver guy (named Bogus). Bogus takes 40 points of damage and nearly dies!
- Cleric heals Bogus. The party tries to rest. Then, Bogus hears crows outside the hut through the magic mirror. Bogus tells the party something is going on outside. Evil wizard goes outside to take a look. Bogus plane shifts the hut away! Evil Wizard is all alone as Noohl's fleet sails the sea of blood. The crows are chaos-crows that have four talons and can breathe probability-altering clouds.
- Evil wizard decides to try to fight off Noohl's fleet with the mighty staff of Ekim, dropping Emirikol's Entropic Maelstrom on a ship, paralyzing the entire crew. She summons a wall of eyes that fire lasers (custom spell from his patron - The One Who Watches From Below). But Noohl's catapult-launched ogre paratroopers drop down past the wall and hack into the evil wizard, dropping her to a single hit point. She surrenders, and offers to help Noohl take down her former allies and snatch the Balance Blade from them.
Bogus and evil wizard will each be emailing me extensive plans in what will be the final battle of the campaign. It'll be Noohl's army and the evil wizard vs. the party.
Normally I discourage inter-party combat, but everybody is enjoying it and it's not personal, so what the hell. It's all ending anyway, so why not? This has been brewing since the very first session - the evil wizard has nearly betrayed or come to blows with the other characters on numerous occasions.