[Day 44 – Into the Black Keep]
[This game uses the Pathfinder 1E roleplaying game. Game sessions happen once a week. This session happened March 27, 2023.]
[SPOILERS! If you are likely to adventure through the Shattered Star Adventure Path from Paizo, this campaign will be spoilers all the way down.]
Player Characters
Marativy – female ratfolk 9th level Ninja
Zitch Grimreaper – male ratfolk 9th level Witch with a donkey rat (capybara) familiar
Roscuro – male ratfolk 9th level Monk
Swamprover – female grippli 9th level Wizard
Winston – male ratfolk 9th level Gunslinger
Via Roll20
Templeton von Trapp – male ratfolk 9th level Summoner (Synthesist)
NPCs
Gridik Stormstride – male blue kobold 7th level Wizard (Invoker)
Hrefna – female changeling 7th level Omdura
Ariphi – female tiefling 7th level Rogue
Fish – male grodaire, actual name is Hummlgau
Autumn
Day 44 continued
“What’s all this racket about?”
The owner of those words was a skinny undead female gunslinger, standing in the open doorway on the north side of the Black keep. She was looking out on the aftermath of the Ratpack’s fight with four wyverns.
Templeton [large-sized] and Marativy were just around a corner of the Keep while the rest of the Ratpack were 40 to 60 feet from the keep, regrouping and doing some quick emergency healing. Templeton moved quickly around the corner, intent on pushing the gunslinger back into the building. The gunslinger shot him with a pistol [attack of opportunity] and then firmly held her ground [mostly due to the penalties associated with a Large person attempting to squeeze in through a normal door]. Marativy to the opportunity to acrobatically weave her way under Templeton and past the gunslinger, into a set of stables.
The gunslinger stepped back five feet and rapid-fired her pistols, shooting Templeton and Marativy three times each. Marativy focused her ki to become invisible, made a five-foot step of her own, and attacked the gunslinger from surprise with a slash of her wakizashi. Ariphi advanced towards the keep, careful to stay alert. Swamprover identified the gunslinger as Pale Stranger, a planes-drifting form of undead, and then moved to get a better line-of-sight. Roscuro swiftly closed the distance and moved into the stables to Marativy. From there he attacked the gunslinger, knocking her off balance and triggering an attack from Marativy [he made a critical hit, which triggered a free attack for Marativy as they both have a teamwork feat whose name escapes me at the moment] which hit just as hard [we did 30 and 31 points of damage, respectively]. Hrefna advanced to the doorway and cast Bless. Zitch advanced and put Protective Luck on Templeton. Gridik advanced and cast Magic Missile at the enemy gunslinger. Templeton reversed course and forced his way through the double-doors around the corner, entering a side room and cutting off escape for the gunslinger that way. Fish moved up to get a better view of what was going on.
The enemy gunslinger stepped away from Marativy and Roscuro and put a single shot into Marativy’s shoulder [for 43 points of damage]. Marativy spat out some blood, turned invisible, closed the five feet distance, and did a full attack, hitting twice [once critically]. Ariphi closed and performed a Feint, catching the gunslinger off guard [and making the her flatfooted]. Swamprover cast Flaming Sphere and put it in the same space as the gunslinger who stepped around it. Then Roscuro stepped adjacent to Marativy while focusing his ki and performed a flurry of blows, two of which hit [bad rolls on the other three] one critically setting up the gunslinger for a final attack from Marativy, which dropped the gunslinger.
While the rest of the Ratpack entered the stables, Zitch and Hrefna patched up Marativy. A quick search of the gunslinger turned up two masterwork pistols and nothing else. Gridik and Winston split the pistols between them.
The single remaining door out of the stables led deeper into the keep. Some form of black mist was continually seeping under the door. Marativy checked the door for traps and opened it.
The next room was a large ballroom or entry hall. The ceiling was as dark as midnight and unseeable. There were eight sets of plate armor lining the long walls of the room, four to a side. The west wall had the entry door to the entire keep while where the eastern wall would have been were stairs up to an octagonal room of indeterminate use [throne room? orchestra seating?]. The floor was covered with mist about ankle high.
Gridik cast Dancing Lights and sent them up to the ceiling to determine if it was there or not. The lights went up to a height of 25 feet and then stopped, but the ceiling itself did not show. Templeton, Swamprover, and Winston entered the ballroom to look around. The door between the rooms started to automatically shut, but Marativy dove through before it closed and audibly locked. More of the mist started pouring from the open visors of the sets of plate armor, rapidly increasing the depth of the mist in the room. A voice addressed those in the room, but those in the stable could not hear it clearly [so I didn't take notes].
Marativy activated her shadow clones and drew her sword, looking for targets. Ethereal skulls erupted from the floor and passed through Winston, chilling him as they stole some of his life force [hit point damage, not stat damage]. Swamprover climbed up onto Templeton’s back to get out of the mist and looked around. She spotted a huge vapory thing and called out a warning. Roscuro verified the door between rooms was locked and then called Ariphi to come pick it. On the other side of the door, Winston loaded an adamantine bullet, activated his bag of abundant ammunition, and then shot out the doorknob and lock of the door between the rooms. Ariphi moved forward to pick the lock, saw it was no longer in existence, turned to Roscuro, and said, “Done!” She then advanced into the ballroom. In the ballroom, Templeton looked around for the “huge vapory thing” and located it. He attacked it, connecting with it once to no noticeable effect [he could tell something was there, but his attack did no damage]. Something else in the room, invisible until now, plucked Ariphi up from the floor and flew up to the ceiling with her. It looked like the flayed upper torso of a woman with flayed, bat-like wings. Hrefna advanced into the ballroom and activated a defensive aura [+2 to AC for allies]. She also identified the flying thing as a Manananggal, a blood drinker with sleep and fear spell powers that was vulnerable to weapons of light [which no one had]. Zitch stepped to the door between rooms and identified the huge vapory thing as a Hungry Fog, an ooze variant that was vulnerable to wind and immune to polymorph effects. It also had some level of damage resistance as an ooze. Gridik cast See Invisible to help see the Hungry Fog and to verify there were no additional invisible foes.
End of Session
Rat Whispers
[We had to pause the game here. It was close to our normal stopping point and we were about to start what looked to be a long combat. So rather than run very long on a week night, we paused things.]
Ratpack
Book 1: Shards of Sin Landing Page – Links to all Book 1 sessions
Book 2: Curse of the Lady’s Light Landing Page – Links to all Book 2 sessions
Book 3: The Asylum Stone Landing Page – Links to all Book 3 sessions
Last Session: Session 28
Next Session: Session 30
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