DND Blog

A place to keep DND session recaps, from various campaigns.

The Hundred and First Session

April 27, 2024, Campaign: As the ground quakes, evil wakes

We discover the false priest, and a plot to open a portal with obsidian pumice "wrenches". This comes to a head at the Umberlee service, as the false priest summons a shoggoth. We kill th false priest and the shoggoth, placate Umberlee, and then close the portal.

Table of Contents

  1. Last session
  2. Looting the bodies
  3. Back at the Mansion
  4. The Ceremony
  5. Next session

"Trust me. We're not going to have a hundred more [sessions]."

Last session

We freed Miranda. We broke into the Thieves' hideout and killed them all, including the Thief Lord Sige, and Trevor.

Looting the bodies

From the other bodies we retrieve some vials of poison, which is wyvern poison.

We gain 1375 gold apiece.

We find a door behind Sige's chair, which reveals a tunnel leading back to town.

In a storeroom we find some chests, which reveal:

Another door reveals a barracks.

A third door reveals a hallway. Down this hallway is a darkened, rough-carved hallway, heading northeast.

A fourth door is opened to a small shriek of surprise! In the room are a male Dwarf and a female Halfling. They're chained down. Their work is to refine poisons that are imported. We use Sige's keys to unlock their manacles. They come from Cinderland. We don't know where that is, but we say we'll try to get them home. They've been here for years.

A fifth door reveals an armory: lots of crossbows and daggers.

Back in the main room, Jerry hears murmurs from one of the unopened doors. It sounds like a group of people coming down the hallway.

So we decide to leave.

We go out the Stoat-Seller's Secret Door in the jail, bringing the two brewers with us.

Jerry is the last up the rope, and hears someone shout, "What the F—" as she shuts the hatch. We kick some dirt in the hole.

We go back towards Alistair's Magic Mansion, picking up Miranda and the Cleric today. Those two are moving slow, so Ryltar takes the shape of a drafthorse.

Back at the Mansion

At Alistair's mansion, Bugfood pressures the Party into giving up some of their loot: 1000 gold apiece from Jerry and Ryltar, and the jeweled gold chalice. Percival keeps the big gold wok.

Bugfood is distraught at the idea of wyverns being milked, and tells Mr. MacGuffin so. MacGuffin reassures him about the humanity of the wyvern milking, and silently begs the party for help.

We learn that the local church is pushing for offerings. They're building "the wrench", a mechanical device to compress the obsidian pumice and release the globules trapped inside it. They had a prototype, which crushed some stone and was destroyed. They were tasked to make more.

The spiders had more of a transmutation genre; the phenomena from this pumice are more conjuration based.

The cold iron tuning fork is identified as Avernus, the first of the Nine Hells.

The wood tuning fork is the Feywild.

We ask some questions of the priest about why he's got a doppelganger. He doesn't know. He's only interacted with the stone once: he communed with Umberlee to learn about its properties. He never got teleported. He's worried about Umberlee, the goddess to whom were pledged the tithes that the Thieves stole.

We wait around for a bit, drinking hot cocoa, for three hours. We ask the priest if he wants to come with us; he says that the offering needs to happen. Get it into the water, and offer a prayer.

The Ceremony

Two acolytes walk in from the side aisles. The false high priest rises from the water at the front of the amphitheatre, and walks up out of the water onto the steps.

"Calm yourselves, calm yourselves. We are gathered for this offering so that our prayers will be answered. Our dreams will become real. Rejoice, rejoice. We will be joined by a champion of Umberlee. Praise! Praise!" He repeats this again, and the ground shudders and shakes. Bugfood and Ryltar are thrown flat. Northwest, into the sea, a crackling red light pulses up out of the water. A very small tidal wave occurs.

Ryltar asks aloud, "Where's the sacrifice?"

He concludes that we're the offering.

"Rejoice! Rejoice! Praise! Praise!" The only difference between this priest and the real one is that this guy has no facial expressions.

Bugfood shouts, "No! I object!" and casts Call Lightning at fifth level. 6d10 lightning damage. It doesn't really do much.

We all roll horribly, and the amphitheater's seating becomes difficult terrain from the panicked (later, stunned) masses.

  1. Round 1: A shoggoth appears! Jerry is paralyzed by the False Priest's attack.
    1. Lair actions! A piercing high-pitched whine occurs. The thing seen under the waters reaches the shore. It's madness and chaos given form! A shoggoth! Ryltar is stunned for a minute by the madness!
    2. The shoggoth starts eating people.
    3. The priest moves up to Bugfood and makes three Whispering Blade attacks. For 19 damage, and a little psychic damage. Then the priest's arm turns to tentacles, and reaches out to Jerry. With a 1 she is paralyzed until the end of her next turn.
    4. Vurguron moves to keep the priest and shoggoth in line of fire, and then casts Lightning Bolt. The priest and shoggoth save for half damage.
    5. Bugfood Calls Lightning on the priest for a little damage.
    6. The priest disengages from Vurguron.
    7. Percival casts a big attack against everything in the front of the amphitheatre.
    8. Jerry is paralyzed this round.
  2. Round 2: Vurguron finally uses Indominatable, and the priest turns into a mass of tentacles.
    1. Vurguron and Bugfood take poison damage from small rips in reality releasing poisonous gas.
    2. The Shoggoth takes two steps forward, out of the water. It pulls four more people into its aberrant maw.
    3. The priest runs up to Vurguron and casts Debilitating Touch. Vurguron is unable to dodge, but casts Indominatable and succeeds in avoiding the paralysis. One manages to pass his Shield, and crits, and he takes 16 piercing and 23 psychic damage. With a 6 Wisdom save, he listens to the cackling blade, and his voice joins the laughter. He is unable to speak.
    4. Vurguron cannot speak! He attacks the priest for a little, and then Second Wind.
    5. Bugfood Calls Lightning again, hitting Vurguron but not the priest, for minimum damage, dealing 20 to Vurguron and 10 to the priest. Bugfood follows with Balm of the Summer Court.
    6. Percival activates his bracer, then casts Fireball: 28 to the shoggoth, halved to 14.
    7. Jerry casts a fourth-level Lightning Arrow at the shoggoth and misses; it takes 6d8 halved to 9. The second arrow deals 10 piercing and is absorbed.
    8. The priest uses Amorphous Escape. He dissolves into a shifting mass of tentacles and flesh. Jerry and Vurguron make Int saves; she takes 9 psychic damage and Vurguron takes 4.
  3. Round 3: Jerry is grappled by the shoggoth and almost dies twice!
    1. The Shoggoth advances and makes two attacks at Jerry, 26 and 36 to hit. She takes 34 bludgeoning on the first hit and 20 on the second, grappled and restrained.
    2. The priest, with advantage on his attacks, makes two attacks on Vurguron, critting once, for so many damage. Then he attacks Jerry, critting, for 25.
    3. The priest reforms. Vurguron has advantage on his attacks because of Jerry's presence, so he deals a lot of damage to the priest.
    4. Bugfood Calls Lightning on the priest and misses; Jerry is down. Bugfood Balm of the Summer Courts Jerry for 12 HP plus 3.
    5. The priest stabs Jerry with a Whispering Blade; with Relentless Endurance she falls to 1 and with Orcish Fury she stabs him for 8 slashing. But she is now unable to speak.
    6. Percival Hold Monsters the shoggoth, and it holds. Bonus, Bardic Inspiration on Ryltar.
    7. The priest makes his legendary action to flee Jerry.
    8. Jerry is freed from shoggoth's grapple by its paralyzed state. She attacks the priest and misses. Then she chugs a Potion of Supreme Healing for almost 50 hp.
  4. Round 4: The priest dies from Mental Prison.
    1. More poison attacks from the lair.
    2. The shoggoth manages to not kill as many people; it's Held.
    3. The priest advances on Percival, and paralyzes him. Three autocrit attacks, except for one miss, and Percival takes a little damage and cannot speak. He loses concentration on holding the shoggoth. He is down to 60 HP and paralyzed.
    4. Vurguron attacks the shoggoth a little.
    5. Bugfood attacks the Shoggoth for a lot.
    6. Percival is paralyzed.
    7. Jerry casts Hunter's Mark and stabs the high priest twice for a little, about 8.
    8. Ryltar casts Mental Prison on the priest, and it takes but 36 psychic damage, halved to 18. His head explodes like a water balloon; his tentacles feel around for a bit an then collapse. (It had 17 HP.) Ryltar points to the shoggoth and shouts: "I hate you, and I hate that thing!"
  5. Round 5: With the priest dead, the lair stops acting. The shoggoth is immune to slicing damage.
    1. The shoggoth is upset. It moves up to him and slams — Ryltar Shields the first attack, but the second deals 26 bludgeoning, grappling and restraining.
    2. Vurguron advances.
    3. Percival upcasts Hold Person on the Shoggoth, but fails.
    4. Jerry attacks the shoggoth, but it doesn't get sliced. She yells at it.
    5. Ryltar Shadow Steps away, and then casts Slow on the Shoggoth.
  6. Round 6: The shoggoth is not immune to bludgeoning, but is immune to cold damage. Nevertheless, Hold Monster.
    1. Jerry successfully intimidated the shoggoth. It attacks her for 26 damage, grappling, and restraining. It passes the Slow check and is no longer slowed.
    2. Vurguron uses his breath weapon against the Shoggoth; it takes 12 fire damage.
    3. Percival again upcasts Hold Monster and holds it.
    4. Jerry switches her Slayer of the Unnatural to bludgeoning and deals 42 autocrit, 36 bludgeoning. It jiggles. It might be resistant to some of the damage.
    5. Ryltar casts Cone of Cold at the shoggoth. It's immune to cold damage.
  7. Round 7: The shoggoth remains held. The Party deals 150 damage this round.
    1. Vurguron drops Blur, switches to Shadow Blade, and in the stormcloud's dim light he has advantage. With a crit, he does a little damage.
    2. Bugfood does 44 lightning damage with another Call Lightning.
    3. Percival casts Fireball at the creature, for 35.
    4. Jerry switches to piercing, misses one attack, and deals 18 piercing.
    5. Ryltar casts Sunburst in an empty corner of the arena, so that it hits the shoggoth but none of us. It does 43 radiant, and the thing is blinded.
    6. The crackling thunderstorm above releases a giant thunderbolt. Jerry succeeds with a 24 and Vurguron fails, taking 60 damage. Both are still alive, but the Shoggoth has evaporated.

There's a line of crackling red energy offshore.

Jerry wanders down to the shore, gets her feet wet, and offers 400 gold to Umberlee, shouting to b heard aove the storm and waves: "Thanks, Umberlee!" (Religion: 5)

Percival Cure Wounds on Vurguron and Jerry.

Bugfood looks at the red line: it stretches off to the northeast, crackling, underwater, blurry. Heat and bubbling masses come from it. He Wildshapes to an eagle to go fly off to look.

The lighthouse of Umberlee is about 200 feet away; Ryltar teleports into the lighthouse. The floor is flat, and there's a red crackling lightning in the center. There's a chest of gold in the center. He turns into a Giant Ape and drags the gold out, back to the amphitheatre.

Bugfood flies back and does some healing.

Giant Ape drags the gold back and shoves it off the shelf. He turns back into Ryltar, and says, "O Umberlee, hear my prayer. These people know not what they did; forgive them."

We throw the decapitated false priest in, the do some water manipulation to push the water in.

So we realize that there are two things to address:

Black specks begin to fly out of the red line. We unsheath the folding boat and paddle out. Flying distorted octopodes circle. They're coming through the crack in the center of the line of red lighting, which is about 15 feet long. Jerry shoots a Lightning Arrow through, destabilizing the rift. Bugfood's Cone of Cold pinches its edges shut just a little. Percival tries to blow water into the hole with Wind Wall, successfully pushing the water down into it.

The flying octopi scrape up against us, dealing damage.

Vurguron's Intelligence check does something else.

Ryltar spikes his Far Realms shard into the hole, but it bounces off, and then bounces off a little.

Percival tries to Fly and pick up the shard. He passes it to Jerry; she ties it to her last +2 arrow and fires it in. The rift disappears and collapses within itself.

The water goes back to a lazy chop.

The octopi disappear into the ethereal plane.

Down below, we see four "wrenches", four of those mechanisms, scattered on the seafloor with obsidian pumice. They were arranged in a 15' sphere. Bugfood Wildshapes as an octopus and swims down, and brings back some coiled metal and braided steel cable, a housing for something.

We take 15 minutes to draw as much of it as we can.

The sky lessens.

We notice that the tinge, the background whine of mental fog, has faded away.

On the shore, people are scattered around.

Bugfood takes his sister back to Cannerock; he doesn't want to leave her alone.

Next session