beermotor wrote:The wraith is on initiative 8, lucky y'all!
Darrow is frozen with fear and doesn't fire his arrow.
Hector attempts to engage the thing with a chair and sword, and looks quite spectacular while doing so, except the sword passes right through the incorporeal thing, doing nothing so far as he can tell.
Flavia and Chendris are in the other room, and hear the horrified sounds of their companions and the strange, terrible noise of the wraith...
Thorin and Fosco are both frozen with fear and cannot yet flee.
Cathbad swings at the wraith without fear, but her attack passes right through it. She shouts for the black blade...
The wraith strikes at Thorin... 11 + 4 = 15, doing 1 point of freezing damage and draining him of 5 XP! That will likely drop Thorin back to 0 level?
Nope...he started with 10 exp and gathered 6 more since than.
Seeing that this is no normal creature of flesh and blood Thorin and Fosco leave the room. While leaving they are using full defense to lessen the chance of being attacked. Yelling to Cathbad to leave on the way out the door.
Already said Cathbad was backing away....surely, she will follow out the door.
SoBH pbp:
Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.
Hector grabs Orastes and Darrow by the shoulder or elbow and tries to drag/coax them from the room, visions of this thing chasing them out of the ruins altogether...
Darrow is more or less of the same mindset.
Flavia and Chendriss see people moving out of the room. Flavia gets ready to fight, but seeing the looks on the faces, anticipates their running and moves back a few paces. Chendriss grabs a few more books off the shelf, and gets ready to flee...
...
Gnome Boy • DCC playtester @ DDC 35 Feb '11. • Beta DL 2111, 7AM PT, 8 June 11. Playing RPGs since '77 • Quasi-occasional member of the Legion of 8th-Level Fighters.
A flat, hollow voice echoes in their ears seemingly from nowhere and everywhere at once: "Sssssstaaaaaayyyyy wwwwiiiiiiiiiiitthhhhhh meeeeeeeeeeeeee in the daaaaaarrrrrrrrkkkkk <evil chuckling laughter>..."
Hector grabs Darrow and they bolt from the room. Flavia and Chendris see the bolting Hector and Darrow, their faces pale with fright...
Thorin and Fosco flee in terror, provoking an attack from the wraith. The shadowy claws strike Thorin (19 + 4 = 23), freezing him for 1 point of damage, and draining him of another 5 XP! Oof. The thing's claws strike Fosco, also (11 + 4 = 15), freezing him for 4 points of damage and draining him of 5 XP. Double oof. If they're still alive, they flee into the other room. Just curious what their HP / XP totals are now; Thorin for sure just lost level 1... if either or both have been struck down also, then something interesting may happen... !
Cathbad flees from the room screaming.
The wraith attacks Fritz... (8 + 4 = 12, hit; 6 + 4 = 10, hit) ... freezing him for 1 + 3 = 4 damage, and draining him of 2 + 3 = 5 XP. That may mean the loss of a level and life for Fritz, not sure.
But not before he gets a swing off with the black blade. The blade slices through the darkness where the shadowy thing seems to be, and it shimmers a bit as it passes through effortlessly. The air grows colder and the flat, hollow voice echoes again in your ears: the hell-spawned thing is laughing at you!
Portly Trim calls upon the Great Spirit, but his faith falters and nothing happens... he flees in terror (increment deity disapproval one more).
Everyone's back in the study/library room at this point, except for possibly Thorin, Fosco, and Fritz.
/ooc Fritz is down to 1 HP. Can we just assume he's at like 11 XP or something since the first strike didn't knock Thorin down a a level? Obviously I haven't a clue how much XP he has.
I think ALL of my four are pretty much ready to bolt back up the stairs -- this THING is OBVIOUSLY the source of all the evil in this place!
But...
Flavia is not ready to run if anyone alive would be left behind. What she does depends on what the theoretical straggler(s) do(es).
Darrow considers calling upon Rudra to aid their escape -- but is shaken up enough that if pausing to do so means he's there alone in the room genuflecting to Rudra as everyone is through the exit, out and away, he's not going to pause and do that. If someone stays behind, and he has time to make this appeal, I don't mind if you roll the dice, beer. In fact, in this case I think I prefer just hearing what the result is...
Darrow's potential divine-aid speech, if it happens: "Rudra, we have found the evil heart of this wicked den! Aid our escape that we may soon return better able to destroy this defilement, this infection, this poison, once and for all!"
In other words, if everyone else is leaving, my four are leaving, too. If anyone is staying, I have two PCs staying for another round.
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Gnome Boy • DCC playtester @ DDC 35 Feb '11. • Beta DL 2111, 7AM PT, 8 June 11. Playing RPGs since '77 • Quasi-occasional member of the Legion of 8th-Level Fighters.
The bodies of Thorin the dwarf and Fosco the halfling lie motionless on the floor beneath the shadowy wraith, which turns its attention to Fritz and the black blade.
You can hear it laughing manically, the voice echoing from everywhere and nowhere at once.
Sounds like everyone is splitting -- as in 'leaving'.
We are, too.
Flavia suggests falling back to the room with the stairs, at least. She will take up the last place position and keep an eye behind her to see if that thing, or anything else, follows the group.
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Gnome Boy • DCC playtester @ DDC 35 Feb '11. • Beta DL 2111, 7AM PT, 8 June 11. Playing RPGs since '77 • Quasi-occasional member of the Legion of 8th-Level Fighters.
After getting about 100 feet from the room, Cathbad will stop, and look back, to see if the un-dead wraith pursues.
SoBH pbp:
Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.
Yeah I'm open to reviews of the wraith, if people think it's too nasty. That's straight out of the module though. I just gave it 2d20 action dice at +4 attack, d4 freeze damage and d5 XP drain, instead of instant level drain. So I felt like it didn't hit THAT hard. The incorporeality is the killer, of course, but hey... you don't have to fight it.
