SKT Episode 5: Gorgon-fucking-zola!

Starring:

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Season Recap: Chapter 1 – A Great Upheaval

– The party have arrived in the fortified village of Nightstone only to find its human inhabitants have fled following an aerial attack by giants in a floating castle.

– The village was cleared of scavenging goblins and then attempts by both the Zhentarim and a bunch of mostly-peaceful Orcs to take over the village were foiled.

– Our heroes proceeded to the Dripping Caves to rescue the villagers. They killed the goblins and ogres but Q’Aren was killed by a Black Pudding.

– The characters travelled to Triboar and on the way met a cloud giant called Zephyros who travels in a floating tower.

– Zephyros explains that the ‘ordning’, which regulates giant society, is broken and the players are destined to fix it. Or die trying. Which is nice.

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Pre-session Guff

Remarkably little pre-session guff this week aided by the DM forgetting to start recording on time again <sigh>

The main highlight was the DM pointing out that the player minis had all been recreated with white bases, allowing the DM to tint them to the player’s Table Top Simulator name colours for easier identification of who is who (whom? I’m sorry, my face is tired).

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Duel of the Waifs

At the end of last session a bunch of thin and lightly armoured air cultists had landed on the cloud and politely requested an audience with Zephyros. Abelas had responded to this request with uncouth and demeaning language and an utterly uncalled for threat.

Having had his honour impugned (great word!) by a lightweight plebeian, the equally lightweight Amarath felt compelled to enter a duel with the uncivilised, uncultured, unmannerly wizard in order to teach him some much needed restraint and respect.

Roll initiative!

Amarath goes first and he opens the flap on the bag he is carrying, which has a smiley face embroidered on it. He points at Abelas and says “That one!” and starts laughing. Nothing appears to happen.

Abelas activates his Bladesong cheese and casts Hold Person on Amarath who fails the save with style and is paralysed. The DM implied this had not been a terribly well thought out action (twice actually) but that was because the DM was under the impression that Hold Person granted a save when you take damage. It does not, so this was actually a very good move by the melee-not-melee wizard there!

So then we turn to Joffrey <sigh>.

This was genuine question and not a typically overly-sarcastic DM question because, while the DM has known Adam for a few years now, he could well be colour blind without the DM knowing it and if he was colour blind things could be changed to accommodate that.

Adam isn’t colour blind though, he’s just an idiot.

At least at D&D.

Regulus> I think the problem is that the elf on the picture of Abelas looks quite cool and there’s no way his character looks like that.

<sigh> Shots fired! Just wait till you’re rocking 30AC Jake then they’ll be more respectful.

Oh wait, no they won’t.

It’s the cultists turn and they don’t get involved. They just nod to each other in appreciation of Abelas’s move, obviously understanding the situation better than the DM did at least.

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Weapons of Cheese

I don’t know if that was a troll or not but thumbs up for it anyway 🙂

CHEEEEESE!

Regulus also preps an attack with similar conditions as Clay.

N’Von, the other Cult Fanatic, mocked Abelas by laughing at him and saying “The peasant thinks he has done something clever”. What the fuck does she know eh?

However, something invisible makes a melee attack on Abelas, which hits but he uses a cheesy Shield, gains 5AC and the attack consequently misses.

The DM informs Clay he can use his prepped attack because something hits Abelas that was adjacent to him and because he can’t see it, he has to pick one of the seven squares adjacent to the wizard to attack and hope it is the one with the attacker in it.

Clay then indicates he wants to attack a completely different square that is not, in fact, adjacent to the wizard at all <sigh>. Clay fires at a newly chosen square but misses. The cultists boo at this uncalled for interjection into a personal duel and they party gets the impression that any further interference will result in a full scale fight (not that that is ever a bad thing).

Unfortunately, Regulus also prepped an attack but he prepped it against ‘anything I see attack Abelas’ and he did not see what attacked him.

This was a DM fuckup by the way, you do in fact get to choose if you take your prepared action or not. I think being forced to is much more fun though!

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DM cheese is the best cheese <sigh>

Abelas launches a Chromatic Orb attack against Amarath which has advantage because the cultist is paralysed.

Regulus attempts to get Amarath’s Dex bonus to AC removed because CHEEEEESE!

However, not to be too hard on the pscho-bot, Abelas befitted from a significant chunk of DM cheese anyway <sigh>:

Paralysed

– A paralyzed creature is incapacitated (an incapacitated creature can’t take actions or reactions) and can’t move or speak.

– The creature automatically fails Strength and Dexterity saving throws. Attack rolls against the creature have advantage.

– Any attack that hits the creature is a critical hit if the attacker is within 5 feet of the creature.

Well… shit. Oh well, spilt cheese and all that jazz (jazz Adam, JAZZ!).

So Abelas gains a totally undeserved spell crit and, ignoring Joffrey’s variety of opinions on exactly how that worked, sought confirmation from the DM instead.

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Fuck me, D&D is complicated – Episode 2: Spell Crits

Single target spells hit for criticals just like any other attack but the DM has house ruled against AoE spell crits because that is A) Cheese B) AoE spells with an attack roll are rare and C) If players can do it, enemies can do it and you really don’t want enemies critting on AoEs.

You cannot crit on the main AoEs, Fireball, Shatter, Sprit Guardians etc for a reason; that’s the route to total party wipes.

However, some spells have an attack roll and an AoE component. Lets have a look at Ice Knife:

You create a shard of ice and fling it at one creature within range. Make a ranged spell attack against the target. On a hit, the target takes 1d10 piercing damage. Hit or miss, the shard then explodes. The target and each creature within 5 feet of it must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw or take 2d6 cold damage.

In this case, if you roll a 20, the single target portion of 1d10 piercing gets the added crit damage but the second part, 2d6 cold, is an AoE component and does not get doubled.

Next time on ‘Fuck me, D&D is complicated’: invisibility and Faerie Fire.

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That’s ORBit of all right! (sorry)

Joffrey casts Faerie Fire on the group of bad guys clustered near Abelas.

Half of the cultists, and the Invisible Stalker, failed the save and were lit up. The DM introduces a somewhat different mini to the table; just a plain mini-base called ‘Less Than Invisible Stalker’.

Joffrey turns into a Dire Wolf at the end of his turn and Mike gets picky about the DM having sized it to take up only 40ft instead of 10ft <sigh>.

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Fuck me, D&D is complicated – Episode 3: Invisible Stalkers and Faerie Fire

Normally, anything invisible that gets lit up by Faerie Fire gets attacked with advantage:

Any attack roll against an affected creature or object has advantage if the attacker can see it, and the affected creature or object can’t benefit from being invisible.

However, the Invisible Stalker is not a visible creature that has turned invisible, it is inherently invisible. All Faerie Fire does is create a glow around it, you still cannot actually see the Invisible Stalker. Thus, the benefits of the stalker’s invisibility are lost (no disadvantage on attack rolls) but the players still cannot see it so no advantage either.

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You can quote me on that Gary, it’s fine!

All seven of the cultists obey their orders and attack the wizard, five with melee and two with daggers. Abelas blows another spell slot to Shield again and gets hit only once but he could be a bit buggered.

Adam> Whatever happens Jake, you’re in for a world of hurt!

Jake> Nah, I’m fine.

The DM makes a particular note of that because Jake being ‘fine’ is going to come down to whether he make two saves in a row… he just doesn’t know this yet.

Elvira longbows the Stalker but it is resistant to non-magical weapons and takes half damage. A magical Shadow Arrow is launched which deals additional psychic damage but it makes the save and is not blinded/shadowed.

Clay attacked with a warhammer and missed with both style and aplomb. He moved away and got walloped with an attack of opportunity from the Stalker. He then attempted to use his second wind as a bonus action even though his turn had ended. This was discussed at length and even though he is technically able to do it, it was generally agreed that this was still CHEEESE!

Unfair? Maybe. Funny? Definitely.

Speaking of Cheese: N’Von casts Hold Person on Abelas!

“Nah, I’m fine” – Jake, September 2020

He fails the save!

“Ok, I’m not fine!” – Jake, September 2020

Jake desperately turns to Bladesong to save him but Bladesong gives him the middle finger because, good as it is, it aint that good. The wizard is now paralysed and surrounded by enemies that will attack with advantage and auto-crit. The Stalker alone will hit twice for 10 damage each which would both crit for a total of 40 points. That’s gonna hurt!

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You can certainly try!

Joffrey asks if he could bite-attack Abelas and drag him out of the surrounding mobs. Abelas is a bit unhappy with this but Regulus regards it as a win-win.

However, we are dealing with the vagaries of initiative order and Abelas is next. He gets to spend his turn doing nothing BUT at the end of that turn he gets to make another save. If he fails this one he is is dead.

He made it.

Ok, at this point, and indeed going forwards, you may think the DM is a little harsh on Adam. However, you have to understand that Adam has a history of asking if he can do stupid shit which we then waste time exploring when Adam actually has no actual intention of doing the stupid shit. The DM has previously warned Adam that one of these days he would make him do the stupid shit he ‘just asked’ about. This was the day.

Adam was unimpressed.

The cultists attacked Abelas en-mass and took two hits, one a crit. This was followed up by two dagger throws at the wizard and one of those was a crit too. Guess we know where all of Clay’s good dice rolls went.

WIZARD DOWN!

Sadly, Elvira declined the DM’s suggestion of attacking Abelas with a rope arrow and dragging him out of there.

At this point the DM asked everyone to look at the table and see if they could figure out what the DM had forgotten. Clay correctly pointed at Isaac. Yes, three rounds of combat without even adding the cleric to the initiative board <sigh>

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Some days you’re the pigeon, some days you’re the statue.

Clay tried to land a hit for a change:

Clay Action Surged and attacked again and he hit! He used a trip attack and landed 17 damage but N’Von rolled a 20 on the save because dice just like fucking with Matt I guess.

Isaac gets Abelas back on his feet with a Healing Word.

N’Von, somewhat surprised at Clay having landed an attack, casts Hold Person on him to make sure we put a halt to that kind of behaviour! Clay rolls a one on the save. Mike hasn’t seen Matt on one of his streaks before:

Abelas gets up and Misty Steps out of the brawl much to the scorn of the DM and Regulus. Abelas responded to the scorn with an erudite “Fuck you!” and Tolled the Dead on an unfortunate cultist.

The DM then stuffed the initiative order again <sigh>. Joffrey moved over next to Regulus and cheesed Pack Tactics, which grants advantage when he is next to an ally. An unfortunate cultist died. The rest of the cultists, unable to get to Abelas, ran over and attacked the paralysed Clay. Yet another DM crit landed but that was all that hit.

Regulus pointed out that the Less Than Invisible Stalker hadn’t had a turn because the DM had forgotten about it and stuffed the initiative order yet again <sigh>

Elvira attacked the Stalker but rolled a critical miss, the DM rolled a d6 to see what it hit and it hit, and killed, a cultist instead! Bonus.

Clay rolls for his save against Hold Person!

Clay rolls really low!

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And isn’t it ironic, don’t you think?

FIGHTER DOWN!

Matt goes very quiet.

Abelas> There’s maths going on here!

Clay had 14 hit points left out of 36 so it would have taken 50 points to kill him outright. He lives by 8 points!

Joffrey then repeatedly asks Abelas to ‘mount me’ in a distinctly rapey voice. Abelas refuses and Regulus gets upset that he wasn’t asked to mount the Dire Wolf <sigh>

Abelas, faced with four cultists, three of which are lit by Faerie Fire, launches a guaranteed-hit Magic Missile at one of the lit ones instead of the unlit one <sigh>

At this point Abelas is attacked by the Less Than Invisible Stalker and then asked why he didn’t Shield, replies that Shield is a level 2 spell. The ensuing meltdown was highly entertaining and if I reproduced it here would mostly consist of two pages of Jake swearing interspersed with a page of laughter and abuse and a recalculation of all the wizards spell slots because he had been spending them wrong for the entire fight. Good times.

Abelas then redeems himself by dropping a Shatter on the cultists surrounding the downed Clay. This does cause Clay to fail a death save but it kills all four cultists and nicely messes up N’Von as well.

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Gorgon-fuckin-zola!

Joffrey moves over next to the unconscious Clay and attacks N’Von:

CHEEEEEESE!

<laughter and abuse is hurled at Adam for a while>

The attack, without the benefit of cheesed advantage, still hits and kills N’Von.

The fight wraps up with Clay making a death save and hoping not to get a 1. He gets healed by Joffrey who cheap-ed out with a level 1 Healing Word. The Less Than Invisible Stalker gets pounded by everyone but it has 104 hit points and is resistant to non-magical weapons so it can tank a fair bit. However, Zephyros floats down from his study just long enough to hit it with a level 6 Magic Missile which neatly vaporises the glowing invisible stalker.

Loot is rolled for and Joffrey wins the bag with the smiley face which is actually a Bag of Holding. Inside the bag is a pouch with ten pinches of Pixie Dust. When sprinkled on a creature they roll a d100 and gain the following:

1-70 – Flying speed of 60ft for 10 minutes

71-80 – DC 11 Con save or unconscious for 1 minute

81-90 – DC 11 Wis save or hit by a Confusion spell

91-100 – Invisible for 1 hour.

They were contemplating testing it immediately with the added spice of sprinkling it on the victim volunteer just as they jumped off the cloud.

Adam> <happily> You gave this to the worst possible person didn’t you?

DM> You have a 70% chance of making it, a 20% chance of not caring if you make it and a 10% chance of no one seeing if you make it.

The party marked their victory over the cultists with some celebratory mayonnaise from the Alchemy Jug.

Of course, they have just made an enemy of an entire evil cult but I’m sure it will be fine.

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Is it a Bard? Is it a Plane? No.. ah crap it IS a bard wait .. is that a fucking DRAGON?!

The following day, the party are outside enjoying the view as the world slips by beneath them when Joffrey spots a huge silver dragon approaching the tower with what appears to be armoured dwarves clutched in its talons. The DM advised them they had a couple of minutes to prepare.

Ok, two things to note A) Isaac is not actually an idiot he is very wise, he just cant add up and reason things out too well. B) The DM is discovering, as Chris did, that having an Intelligence of 5 is a remarkably good excuse for doing things you probably wouldn’t normally do.

The players take refuge inside the tower with the wizard and the druid bravely hiding under the table.

The silver dragon (Clarion) approaches the tower, circles it up at the top and roars at the griffons. The griffons scatter. The dragon then lands on the cloud to the right of the entrance and drops off six dwarves.

One of the dwarves has subdued silver trim on his armour and he turns to the dragon “Would you kindly keep an eye on that one master Clarion?” nodding in Isaac’s direction. Then he turns to his team:

“Lord’s Alliance Strike Squad: you know your orders and you know who gave ‘em! Destroy the navigation orb and end the threat. Bottoms up!”

The dwarves all drink potions and turn into misty clouds. They start moving towards the tower entrance at a speed of 10ft per turn. Clarion takes to the air and moves to a station in front of the main entrance.

Arcana checks were made and the party understands that this is Gaseous Form and while in the form of a misty cloud, the target can’t talk or manipulate objects.

Isaac runs into the tower and starts babbling about Lord’s Alliance turning into clouds and heading towards the tower.

That was the second big Lord’s Alliance hint drop by the DM and he was starting to get that ‘obtuse’ tingle about his players again.

To be fair to Adam, listening back on the audio the DM’s voice was really quiet on the first line and part of it dropped out. This whole miscommunication was still funny though and the whole incident greatly tickled the DM who took some time to get the game back on track. I was very tired, that’s all I’ve got.

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Negotiations

Regulus proposed talking instead of fighting. That’s a really good idea as Clarion has around 250 hit points, an AC of ‘fuck-me-that’s-hard’ and does three melee attacks at +13 to hit. Not picking a fight with it is a really good idea.

As Drikk Fra-Kar, six-time grand champion of the Luskan extreme arena once said: “Generally speaking, the only thing that wins in a fight with a dragon is the dragon”

Joffrey asked if anyone was part of the Lord’s Alliance (the DM never doubted you!). It took a while but Elvira remembered that she was part of that faction.

I’m not sure if this was a judgement on Elvira’s negotiating skills but Joffrey gets a fantastic idea:

The ‘idea’ was relegated to a backup plan which was a good choice because if they had jumped off a perfectly good cloud the DM would have landed them in far deeper shit than the shit they were currently in.

Elvira was bravely volunteered to go and negotiate with the cloud dwarves THAT CANNOT SPEAK. The DM dies a little more inside. Finally Joffrey suggested that Elvira talk to the fucking dragon instead of the fucking dwarves! Halle-fucking-lujah.

As Drikk Fra-Kar, six-time grand champion of the Luskan extreme arena once said: “Generally speaking, negotiation is the art of saying ‘now calm down, we’re all friends here!’ until your spellcasters are in range and you can go ‘SURPRISE MOTHERFUCKERS!’ Unless of course the thing you are negotiating with can swat you like a fly, then it’s a matter of sucking up to it and buying time while the others leg-it.”

Elvira is the sacrificial lamb sent out to be a scooby-snack for the adult dragon:

Elvira explains that she is part of the Lord’s Alliance, that Zephyros is a friendly giant and has no part of the recent attacks and that he is helping restore the ordning.

This is a Persuasion check with a DC of 15. That is made with advantage if the person making it is part of the Lord’s Alliance. It is made with disadvantage if any of the dwarves had been killed. If the check fails, one further check can be made to persuade the dragon. If the second check fails as well, the dragon and the dwarves say they cannot take any chances and they attack the navigation orb crippling the tower. Zephyros will not use violence against them.

Zephyros has descended to the first floor as Elvira approaches Clarion and the situation is tense. However, Elvira rolls an 18 on the first check, Clarion believes her and calls off the attack. The leader of the dwarves is impressed with Elvira’s show of courage facing down an adult dragon and invites her to visit Mithral Hall. The dragon picks up the dwarves and departs the tower.

The DM asks for history checks and several of the party recall that in the times before the humans, dwarves and elves ruled these lands, giants and dragons inhabited them and were dire enemies. That enmity persists to this day.

Ding ding! Level 5!

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The DM is really going to regret this

Zephyros drops them off about half a day’s travel from Triboar. He doesn’t want to take the tower anywhere near a town at the moment. Before the party departs he passes each of them a pouch with 100g in it for ‘seeing off the unwanted visitors’. Joffrey attempted to embezzle Isaac’s share <sigh>

Zephyros also has an item for Regulus that he got from a friend on the lost island of Lantan. It is a prototype Gnomish Pontification System with a built-in Satisfactory Navigation module. It can tell you where you are (sometimes), it can tell you where the nearest settlement is, it can tell you how long it will take to get there (sometimes), and it can tell you which direction it is in (it is stuck on north). It is also stuck on ‘automatic mode’ but Zephyros doesn’t know what that means.

It can also give you information about the nearest settlement. The accent is rather… annoying. This is what it has to say about Triboar:

– Triboar is a mercantile towwwwn!

– It was built where The Long Road meets the Evermoor Waaaaay!

– The name is thought to originate from a traveller slaying three boars in one day over three–hundred years agoooo!

– Nearly half of Triboar’s population live outside of the town in ranches and farrmsteaaaaads!

– Triboar’s main market is for horses raised on the rancheeeees.

– The town is rules by an elected Lord Protectooooor!

– The laws are enforced by the Triboar Tweeeelve!

– These are mounted warriors drawn from the local militiaaaa!

– Due to its central location, Triboar is home to numerous guides who escort merchants and travellers all over the Sword Cooooooast!

The GPS also runs on cheese (stop laughing!). You need to put a small amount of cheese in the back compartment once a week.

Zephyros gently hands the GPS to Regulus, clearly glad to be rid of it and he then fondly bids farewell to the party and was last seen waving to them from his cloud as he heads off to the Moonshae Isles for a well-deserved holiday.

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You are in… Tribooooooar!

Half a day later the group enter Triboar and pass a tavern called the Triboar Arms (burned down twice, rebuilt twice!) and take some refreshment. The prices are reasonable, the staff are cordial and the food and drink are good. The owner, a tiefling called Nemyth, informs them of the main layout of the town. The two main areas of interest to the party are the Lionshield Coster to complete their quest for Morak and the Lord Protector’s tower as she may have work for them.

They head over to the Lionshield Coster to complete the quest and do some shopping with Regulus lamenting that he only needs another 1,390 gold pieces to be able to get some plate armour.

The Lionshield Coster looks as if it has been recently refurbished and the party are greeted by the two human proprietors Aleastra Ulgar and Narth Tezrin who ask what they can do for the party today.

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My CPU is a neural-net processor; a learning computer.

<sigh>

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Are we learning yet?

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Bag of Tricks – Grey (The DM is going to regret this as well)

Wondrous Item, uncommon

This ordinary bag, made from grey cloth, appears empty. Reaching inside the bag, however, reveals the presence of a small, fuzzy object. The bag weighs 1/2 pound.

You can use an action to pull the fuzzy object from the bag and throw it up to 20 feet. When the object lands, it transforms into a creature you determine by rolling a d8 and consulting the table that corresponds to the bag’s colour.

The creature is friendly to you and your companions, and it acts on your turn. You can use a bonus action to command how the creature moves and what action it takes on its next turn, or to give it general orders, such as to attack your enemies. In the absence of such orders, the creature acts in a fashion appropriate to its nature.

Once three fuzzy objects have been pulled from the bag, the bag can’t be used again until the next dawn.

D8:

1 – Weasel

2 -Giant Rat

3 – Badger

4 – Boar

5 – Panther

6 – Giant Badger

7 – Dire Wolf

8 – Giant Elk

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The DM didn’t think he’d regret it quite so soon though…

It was immediately agreed that the creatures summoned by the bag had to have Pokemon names. Joffrey wanted his wild shapes to be part of the bag leading to Regulus saying “I summon YOU… Insensitive Bastard!” <sigh>

Speaking of insensitive bastards, Clay wanted to sell the haversack, a dead man’s gift to the party <sigh>

Then the psycho-bot determined he could summon three creatures each morning and then dissect them just before dawn <sigh>

Once they had stopped being quite so.. well.. them, they headed for the Lord Protector’s keep which seemed quite busy and were shown inside. Darathra Shendrel is the current Lord Protector of Triboar and she greeted the party, identified herself as a Harper to Regulus, and explained that orcs had recently raided an outlying ranch and the Twelve had been dispatched to investigate.

In the meantime she had a more underhanded task that she needed unknown people for, people who could take care of themselves. About five years ago a rich, retired adventurer called Hyuth Kolstaag had leased some land from the Crown and built a mansion on a ridge overlooking the north part of town.

Kolstaag is a complete dick, had many enemies anyway and made a bunch more once he moved into town. Recently, three assassins tried to eliminate him. They failed. As they escaped town they killed a stableboy on a nearby ranch. Kolstaag has neither admitted any responsibility nor offered compensation to the family.

After the assassination attempt, Kolstaag has enlisted four gargoyles to guard his estate. Unfortunately, they get bored just being perched on the corners of the mansion and have taken to swooping down on passing travellers to scare them. Meetings with Kolstaag have proven fruitless as he stubbornly refused to see the problem.

Darathra wants the party to walk past, provoke an ‘attack’ from the gargoyles and obviously be forced to defend themselves vigorously. She asked that they avoid direct confrontation with the wizard if they could help it and stated she could handle the fallout if they handle the gargoyles.

The party tried to tell Darathra a seemingly endless stream of inanities she either already knew or just didn’t give a single toss about and eventually they ran out of things she didn’t need to hear and fucked off.

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Rock On!

The DM moves the party up near The Boar’s Rest.

Regulus> I don’t want to get into a fight now because I haven’t chosen my names yet for my creatures. I’ll end up with shit ones like Badgernator and… Weaselor!

Jake then derailed the entire session for about 10 minutes by saying that even Mike’s godawful names were better than the current iteration of Pokemon and sparking a lengthy nerdgasm debate <sigh>

Thankfully, the second time through the DM could listen to it on double speed so they all sounded like smurfs. Good times.

As they saunter close to the estate trying to look conspicuous (it’s the opposite of ‘fly casual’), two gargoyles lift off from the building and close on the party screeching threateningly. Making full use of Isaac’s 5 Int the DM has him scream “DEMONS!” and Guiding Bolts the lead gargoyle. Roll initiative!

Clay> One of my better rolls this evening… seven!

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That moment when the DM asks “Are you sure?”

DM> You get a surprise round because they definitely were not expecting to be attacked back.

Elvira has a gargoyle up in her grill so she goes melee and double stabs it.

The DM forgets again what Dual Wielding is called in D&D; Two Weapon fighting. Load of pish.

Joffrey runs into the age old druid problem; so much cool shit to use and only one concentration spell. He is also reticent about blowing too many spell slots too early. The DM knows this will be the only fight of the day though and tempts him into using Call Lightning.

A 60ft diameter storm cloud appears above the battlefield, helpfully highlighted in bright pink by the DM. Joffrey can now use an action to call a bolt of lightning down which hits everything in a 5ft radius of the impact point. This will be somewhat important later.

Having not nuked the house, Joffrey retreats a bit and Wild Shapes into a Dire Wolf.

Clay figures he needs all the help he can get and moves into a flanking position opposite Boarax Thismightchange for the +2. He rolls a 5 and misses. His second attack hit though. He then Action Surged and did another two attacks.

At this point there was a discussion on the flanking bonus:

I think they all missed that one 🙂

We couldn’t fit ‘Second Lastbelas’ on the initiative tracker so had to settle for ‘Not Lastbelas’. While this does not adequately sum up Jake’s hideously bad initiative, it had to do.

A combination of Chromatic Orb, a warhammer, some double stabby shortswords and double lightning attacks took out the first two gargoyles with relatively few issues.

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Unintended consequences

Then it was Joffrey’s turn but he didn’t want to hit the house with his Call Lightning so he held his attack:

CHEEEEEESE!

At the end of that round a very angry wizard appears from the house demanding to know what the hell was going on.

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Until we meat again!

Magic Missiles and a near-max longbow attack from Elvira obliterated the fourth gargoyle leaving only the wounded third gargoyle next to Boarax Thatmightchange.

Nobody chose to attack the wizard and combat ends. The wizard had a proper meltdown and strops off to see the Lord Protector. A nearby nondescript farm hand approaches Regulus, winks and informs him that a number of carefully placed witnesses saw who attacked first and he advises them to lay low for a couple of hours and then go collect their reward.

The group decide to head back to the Triboar Arms for a drink but first Regulus squares off with the Dire Wolf Joffrey:

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Regulus is so disgusted he just walks off. Joffrey tucks in. Abelas and Elvira walk off with Regulus. Joffrey takes a fried leg over to Clay as a peace offering. Clay throws it and calls out “Fetch!”.

So three of them head to the bar and Joffrey and Clay stay behind playing fetch.

Let us take a moment to member Boarax Thatmightchange and all the joy he brought us with his all too brief existence.

Ok, moment over, IT’S BARBECUE TIME!

End of Session.

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Next time on Ten-foot Squares:

Tune in next week to find out!