Expedition: Ablesforth: The Demon Hole: Part 2 - 30 Aug 2021

[Marullus]

There is the occasional tree.

...Why do you need to climb a tree? Now you're not going to the cave?

[Rusty Tincanne]

If using Web only gets 1 sniffer but takes Pendleton's warding away, that isn't so good. If he uses it to web up an area and we hope they stumble into it, that's iffy.
If Able climbs a tree, out of reach, he cast cast Hold Person twice, improving our odds. The tree prevents injury.

If not all are Held, then Pendleton can decide that to do with his Web from there. Maybe go back to leading them into the dungeon and try the web on the floor or herding them into the pit trap again.

[Marullus]

Ablesforth spies a broad-branched oak tree in the deeping gloom of the midnight hour; it is nearby upon the hillside. He moves away slowly, grateful that none of the sniffers follow. He doesn't have to test his theory that demons can't climb trees.

Ablesforth summons Eruanna's power, freezing seven of the eight sniffers in their tracks. The last one hisses, but Jacques and Molay quickly dice it into ichorous gobbets in the grass of the pasture. It takes them only a matter of minutes to hack up the other seven as well, leaving a pile of rank-smelling body parts on the hillside.

Date: 02 September 2021, 1:20am
Light: Campfire
Effects: Protection from Evil (All); Invisibility (Pendleton)
Injuries: Ablesforth (severely injured); Dolph (moderately injured); Jacques (moderately injured); Pendleton (mildly injured)

Sniffers following [1d4] = 2[1d4] = 4[1d4] = 3[1d4] = 2
Sniffers following [1d4] = 2[1d4] = 3[1d4] = 3[1d4] = 2
None follow him.

Hold Person [1d4] = 3 [1d4] = 4
7 of the 8 are frozen.

Molay longsword (Thac0 15) [1d20] = 20 [1d8+3] = 6+3 = 9 Jacques longsword longsword (Thac0 16) [1d20] = 17 [1d8+2] = 5+2 = 7

[Zhym]

"Thanks for that, and well done," says Pendleton. "Now, let's try to prevent any more infernal visits. Would you please accompany me into the cave as far as the stairs down?" Once there, Pendleton casts a web to clog the stairs. He casts another on the cave mouth on the way out. "Maybe that will give us a day's peace. Although I certainly would not wager a large sum on that proposition."

Back at camp, he prepares to settle back in for, hopefully, a good night's sleep and a morning's study. It occurs to him, not for the first time, how unlike a real bed a "bedroll" is.

[Marullus]

Making your way back into the cave, Pendleton secures the stairs and the cave mouth with sticky webbing strands. you make it back to the campsite and settle in about 2:00am, grateful for the bedroll as non-bed-like as it may be. You get eight hours of interrupted rest allowing recovery from the night-time encounter. Ablesforth and Pendleton both get to spend an hour refreshing their magical energies while the Templars pack up the camp.

Subtract one torch for the cave gambit. Subtract one day's meals each as you break camp.

Counts as one day of camp healing. Everyone recovers [1d3], see below.

Date: 02 September 2021, 11:00am
Light: Daylight
Effects: Protection from Evil (All); Invisibility (Pendleton)
Injuries: Ablesforth (moderately injured); Dolph (moderately injured); Jacques (moderately injured); Pendleton (mildly injured)

Healing: A [1d3] = 3 P [1d3] = 1 D [1d3] = 1 J [1d3] = 2 M [1d3] = 3

[Zhym]

I just noticed that you had Pendleton as "mildly injured." He used part of a healing potion to bring himself back to full health. I'm happy to have the sips back, though, if you want to say that that action never happened.

Also: ration deducted.

[Marullus]

Records Adjusted.

[Zhym]

"Once more into the breach?" asks Pendleton.

"Lacking any ideas on how to bypass the traps, perhaps we should explore further to the east?"

We could check any of the doors at the bottom of this map:

Demon Hole Map.png (212.03 KiB) Viewed 492 times

[Rusty Tincanne]

Marullus, Can you list HP totals, please?

Going back to Zhym's question about the Sister that visited the party yesterday, could we retcon Molvay taking the 45 EPs we got from the goblins back to town and buying healing potions? I believe that would be 2 healing potions.

Also, 2 days rations deducted from Able, Dolph, Molay, and Jacques.

Able rises and prays to Eruanna on his own, collecting his Prayers for the day. He then takes time to accept "truthin's" from any that wish to offer them for the day. As he does so, he takes his own turn, revealing his miracles of the day:

CLW x4, Light, Bless, Hold Person x2, Find Traps, Dispel Magic, Prayer (60’ radius; +2 attacks, damage, and saving throws, AND -2 penalty to all rolls from enemy. It is unnecessary for the cleric to remain chanting.)

He nods to Pendleton. Yeah, let's get back in there and try a new route. I feel like we've seen them sniffers come through the barracks before. Might make sense to head straight through 'em, goin' round that mean-spirited statue. Dang, I sure do dislike that thing! As they shoulder their packs, he asks for input on how to deal with the infernal they meet. They keep comin' at us in bigger packs. If we gotta fight 'em, maybe we keep a couple warded folks in the surrounding doorways, keepin' more from gettin' in? But really, I'd like to try and snake around 'em. Maybe just use the webbing t' block up doors so them things can't follow?

I was thinking of, maybe, burning the sniffers in the hole again, then casting Bless on them to kill them off. But we might need the spell.

[Zhym]

"I can cast three webs today," advises Pendleton. "I have also reserved an invisibility spell—not that it helps much against the demonspawn."

"Why don't we start at the door at the east end of the barracks room?"

[Marullus]

Marullus, Can you list HP totals, please?

PCs:
(AC 5/4evil) Ablesforth 11 / 24
(AC 8) Pendleton 17 / 17
(AC 7) Idriss (NPC) 17 / 17
(AC 4/3evil) Dolph (NPC) 13 /23
(AC 4/3s/2evil) Jaques (NPC) 14 / 22
(AC 4/3s/2evil) Molay (NPC) 22 / 22

Going back to Zhym's question about the Sister that visited the party yesterday, could we retcon Molvay taking the 45 EPs we got from the goblins back to town and buying healing potions? I believe that would be 2 healing potions.

Sure.
As you spend the day at rest, Molay goes back to town and parleys the 45ep into two healing potions.

[Rusty Tincanne]

"Why don't we start at the door at the east end of the barracks room?"

Able nods in agreement. As they pass the Sniffers in the pit trap, Able checks to see if they regenerated after he had burned them the previous day.

2 healing potions added to inventory. And don't think Able didn't notice Pendleton to the scroll to Dispel magic, Zhym. But it's good to have it in a PCs hands.

[Marullus]

The group carefully makes it's way back into the cavern-shapef and around the pit traps. As they reach the pit with the sniffers in it, they hear active scrabbling and hissing within. Triggering the pressure plate, Ablesforth sees evidence of fire on the walls but the half-heads are completely uninjured. They hiss in hate as they try to climb each other in pyramids to reach the pit's lip. (They would succeed easily if they cooperated, but so far they're competing to each be at the top, pulling each other downward.)

Date: 02 September 2021, 11:30am
Light: Daylight
Effects: Protection from Evil (All); Invisibility (Pendleton)
Injuries: Ablesforth (moderately injured); Dolph (moderately injured); Jacques (moderately injured); Pendleton (mildly injured)

[Zhym]

"Do we have enough holy water to spare to douse them?" asks Pendleton. "Or perhaps we should burn them first, then douse the remains?"

[Rusty Tincanne]

If we burn 'em, I cast Bless the ashes. That should do for 'em.

How many flasks of oil to char them all?

[Marullus]

How many flasks of oil to char them all?

Let's just say four.
The pit trap door and shaft is 10' square, but the room below which it dumps in to is larger than you can see. That said, you are pretty sure that they're all currently clambering over each other in the narrow shaft to try and climb upwards towards you and you have the freedom to do use them thoroughly from above unimpeded before dropping a torch.

[Rusty Tincanne]

Able says a few prayers to Eruanna as he pours the oil onto the Sniffers. A prayer tlfor the safety of the party, a prayer that the Sniffers will stay dead and return to whatever hell they came from, a prayer that they won't smell too, too bad as the burn, and a few more. Once they are fully doused (making their climb all the more difficult), he drops in a little torch to ignite them. Sorry it's gotta be this way, fellers. Honest, I am. But yer an unruly bunch an' this world's better without you. He translates what he said for the others.

Once the half heads are all dead and ash, he casts Bless on their ashes, hoping they will not regenerate.

4 flasks and a torch deducted.

Edit: Did Jaques get any healing from from the infirmary while in town?
Would one flask of holy water be good enough to hlkeep the ashes from regenerating? If so, I'll save the Bless spell.

Also, Able and the Templars have 7 flasks of oil left, and 9 flasks of holy water.

[Marullus]

Edit: Did Jaques get any healing from from the infirmary while in town?

No. Jacques was resting with you at the camp and got his healing there. Molay, who wasn't wounded and didn't need to spend the day resting, went to town and bought you the two potions. You can use the potions to heal Jaques if you like.

Would one flask of holy water be good enough to hlkeep the ashes from regenerating?

Nope. A bless does the room fine, though.

Ablesforth pours the oil and says his prayers, then drops the torch. The oil goes up, burning their fleshy hide like candlewicks. The demonspawn thrash and scream, their howls undeniably sounds of pain and fear as they burn alive in the pit below you. The flames soar high, rising several feet about the pit-lip while the trapdoor in the cave floor remains open. Finally they are reduced to smouldering heaps on the stone floor below, unmoving. You watch a moment, charred briquets reconstituting slowly into flesh in the dim light of the flickering flames. You call upon Eruanna to consecrate the remains with divine power - a cooling breeze wafts through the chamber and the pit, putting out the last of the flames and putting the hellspawn to rest.

Someone lights a new torch as the pit-fires dissippate. (Subtract a torch.)

With that deed accomplished, you begin making your way through the caverns, down the stair, and to the barracks room to inspect the east door. You're pleased to note that the foul cloud which remained in the cavern where you once fought the rats has faded further - you can still catch whiffs of the noxious odor but it is no longer strong enough to impact you as it once did. You pass freely through.

As you reach the large cavern where the stairs downward are located, you pause, hearing banging and seeing movement in the darkness. You see the shuffling forms of a half-dozen goblin zombies there, knocking around the old cookfires. Ablesforth calls upon Eruanna's power and they flee before you, heading back up the rear of the cavern to the next chamber.
(Success is automatic. If you want to change course, I'll redact, but I assume you move on.)

You see neither demonspawn nor goblin as you descend the stair, go through the room with the table, then down the hallway to the barracks room. Where you previously had gone past the smashed door and burned bedframe through the northern door, you now go and inspect the eastern one. It is sturdy, made of heavy wood and reinforced with thick bands of iron. It is locked.

Date: 02 September 2021, 12:10pm
Light: Torch (until 12:50pm)
Effects: Protection from Evil (All); Invisibility (Pendleton)
Injuries: Ablesforth (moderately injured); Dolph (moderately injured); Jacques (moderately injured); Pendleton (mildly injured)[/quote]

[Zhym]

"This is not the first time I've wished we had a thief along with us on this trip," muses Pendleton. "I suspect that it will not be the last. There are door-opening spells, of course, favored by a lower sort of hedge magician who uses magic as a tool for thievery and skullduggery. I, however, never learned them—a choice I am now regretting. In short, I believe our only options are to bash the door down or move on to somewhere else."

[Marullus]

*Bump*
Ablesforth?