Author: Follow Me, And Die!

SESSION 44 – July 22, 2018

Zho Ni questions a dead shaman and learns the numbers the Seer started with. We believe we have killed half the ogre war chiefs and half the ogre shamen. Urman wondered if their fanaticism at such losses would impact their morale. A second question about the Seer’s next move yielded no useful information.

Next Zho Ni cast an augury to attempt to acertain what would happen if we went after the Seer, and the answer was WOE, so we elected to rest up.

We rested, relearned spells. We checked and a second iron golem is slowly re-forming in a mist in its shape.

Then we opened the doors from the temple/binding room of the colossus, and found a side passage. There is a room with lots of holy oil. The barrels are covered with many runes and sigils. Otiben carries and oil barrel in and Zho Ni stokes a brazier, and it glows brighter. All the braziers are thus replenished.

We found a supply closet, a workroom with a broken human sized iron golem, and another workroom with ancient books about the iron golems. Urman attemps to look at one and it falls apart. We close the door hoping to prevent the crumbling of the others until we can perhaps find a way to preserve them to be able to use the information. Urman was able to discern that they require some sort of magical crystal to animate them, so we cannot repair it.

Otiben moves ahead of the rest of the party and finds the signs of battle from ogres and mini iron golems. He spots an iron cage and within is one, perhaps the last of the group of researchers from Vadamor. Ignatius Bavarian holds the twin to the messenger ring. His brother is also a researcher and he was pursuing word of an ancient orc city in The Vale, which we deduce is the city in the midst of the Many Mouths where we fought the vampire. The rings are family heirlooms and he wants back the one Urman has. Urman promises to give it back if we get out of this mess alive. We send him back to the temple with the orcs and he will use the ring to message us if the ogres show up.

We learned from Ignatius that he did not tell them anything about his theories about the colossus when The Seer asked him how to remove the wards restraining it. However, they took his notes in which he surmised that the method of attack we witnessed of chanting to extinguish the braziers and then destroying each iron golem would do the trick. He does not know how the colossus is controlled or if The Seer knows how to do so, as he does not speak ogre and they only asked him for information, never giving it. He was captured by the ogres after evading the mini iron golems on the surface in the city.

We move forward and find the winding way up, and are soon faced with large stone doors. Otiben searches and finds no traps. The doors once had a bar on the inside, but it lies cast aside, broken. The door open out. Otiben opened the door just a bit to peek out, and a glyph of warding with fire injured him, Zho Ni, and Batukhan.

We saw multiple goblin archers on the roofs of buildings across from the massive doors, and three woolly rhinos with a pack of goblins behind them.

Urman blew the Horn of Fear and drove off some of them, while Batukhan, Embrek, Zho Ni, and Otiben charged to deal with the woolly rhinos. They obstructed two of them, and the third ran through the doors and three goblins ran from around the corner to join it.

A furious battle ensued where once again, Urman’s bodyguards and Ygritte were knocked down. Rip, Gunnar, Hades, and Puk, with minor help from the hirelings and Ygritte and all of Urman’s memorized magic missiles stopped the goblins and rhino.

In the street, Otiben used his potion of stinking cloud to tie up the gang of goblins while the others fought the rhinos and other goblins. Two ogres climed out of windows and trapped them. A shaman’s chant from a tower next to them negated Zho Ni’s prayer.

The two rhinos and several goblins and the ogres were dropped. Zho Ni was hit hard and nearly felled, but for a wisely consumed healing potion the moment before. Zho Ni also cast hold person on 3 of the goblin archers and tossed his vial of stinking cloud at one of the ogres so Otiben could finish it and finally climb the tower that so loomed over him.

Two goblin archer ran up when the ogres were felled, and shot into the fray, killing one of the goblins.

At the top of the tower, the goblins not held attempted to hit Otiben, and the archers on the battlements across the street shot into his fight.

All the while, the Seer is taunting us that she sees all and knows all, and how to defeat us….

It appears that the morale of The Seer’s forces is OK.

The fight continues….

SESSION 43 – July 15, 2018

We secured the temple area, barricading the doors through which the Seer’s forces entered.

We found the forces that fled Urman’s Horm of Fear under the gallery and slew them, then sealed all the doors under the gallery.

We poured oil on all the braziers that had gone out and lit them and their flames appear to burn in the same manner as those of the two that were never extinguished.

Batukhan commanded two of the stone bulls to block the doors, three to patrol the room, and one to guard the control room.

We examined the body near the control room, and it appears to have been dead over a month. It bears insignia of a researcher/scholar from the Vadamorian kingdom. He is one of the ones who met the remaining orcs. We suspect that the others are elsewhere and are cut off from escape or captured by the Seer’s forces.

Otiben followed the hallway that the orcs showed us until he found the way blocked by a perhaps ancient collapse.

We set guards with our hirelings and Ygritte to watch the area they had stoneshaped to alert the others if it was breached.

The orcs found the other forces who fled in their direction and let us know, so we went and slew them.

We hurried back to the temple to find it still secured, and made preparations to rest, heal, and re-learn spells before continuing our onslaught on the Seer and her forces.

SESSION 209 – July 11, 2018

We launch and manage to dodge the shot from Xenotel. (Once we finally get to the station, Rallion looks back and Lonely Isle has all buildings leveled and small craters in the ground.) The bits of infected fall and are incinerated as the inner door opens and before the outer door opens, Nash prays to Lysander. The ship heats up from whatever is shot at us.

On the way, Marchmain has the monkey automaton launch with the pill.

When we figure that out Marchmain tries to crash the ship. Nash has Serithaz put Prix in the cube formerly in Marhmain’s skull and Prix takes over the ship in time to prevent us crashing and exploding.

We proceed to one of the airlock close to the central hub/biome.

Nash prays to Lysander the AI and is told there are friendlies in the area and to get to the biome and the friendly AIs will get us to the location of Xenotel’s computer.

We find two storage rooms with 4 dwarf sized and 2 man sized space suits. The two drafe engineers came with us and Bavmorda take dwarf sized suits. Laris and Lambertus each take a suit.

Next are two doors labelled quartermaster. We enter one and Serithaz detects an automaton. Rallion slips off his mind blocking ring and tries to use the gold circlet to control it, and falls unconscious. Nash heals him as the other rush to fight a berserker automaton.

-The automaton pummels Bavmorda and Laris and Kauri pummel it with magic missiles. There is a desk with two drawers and an interface on its -surface, but we have not interacted with the desk, and need to search it when the fight it over. –

SESSION 42 – July 8, 2018

The battle continues…

We manage to deal with the goblins and wolves on the balcony passageway.

Batukhan got to the room the orcs feared, and saw a relatively fresh body (the friendly wizard with the ring?). Ignoring the body he opened the barred doors to the “control room” that is the source of the iron golems that appeared once a brazier was extinguished. Further, there were two groups of six stone bulls, each group of 6 controlled by a glass orb that is part of a pedastal. Batukhan touched the orb and directed the 1st group to attack. He then directed teh second group to go after the Seer.

Urman and Otiben went to the far end of the balcony hallway where Urman had tied a rope and climbed down to get closer. Urman got in position behind a massive pillar and was ready to do something, but the Seer moved in response to attacks by bulls, and took flight.

Otiben jumped on one of the bulls and was able to attack and wound the Seer. The seer rose higher and out of any melee range.

Those still on the balcony continued to deal with the wolves.

Once the wolves were dealt with, Puk and Ygtitte took up positions behind pillars to guard the nearest brazier. Archers dropped Ygritte. Zho Ni and Embrek went to the rope to climb down.

Urman charged into the middle of a group of Ogres and goblins that were the Seer’s honor guard. He blared away on the Horn of Fear, and most fled. This led to the Seer fleeing and yelling for her minions to continue their efforts to be “rewarded by The Enchantress.” Upon seeing her flee, in addition to so many of the other flee from the Horn of Fear, many failed their morale.

Urman was grappled by an ogre, but Otiben rescued him.

Urman used the Horn of Fear multiple times to further reduce the odds.

Zho Ni dispelled some sort of elemental that managed to drop one of the golems right before the elemental was dispelled.

Finally, between the remaining stone bulls, iron golem, and 10 orcs who can running when Gunnar went for help arrived and came down the rope and were able to help Zho Ni and Embrek and Otiben finish off the ogres on the brazier where the elemental had finished off the golem.

Batukhan rushed back and gave the stone bulls direction before they could attack the party.

All enemies were dead or fled. Urman looked at one of the braziers where its golem had been defeated, and the symbols indicate binding and protection, facing into the circle towards the colossus. The crumbled braziers faded. Perhaps they will be renewed and return to do their job.

The doors where the Ogres entered were shut and barred from the inside. the doors the goblins used to get up on the balcony where shut and barred. We are now keeping an eye out for the ogres and goblins that ran towards the caves of the orcs, and are gathering the items on the dead shamen. Urman will collect trophies from each, such as necklaces and rattles, and any other sign of their office. Any thing we can use to rest and heal, we will.

We will retrieve the wounded Ygtitte, and Urman’s bodyguards, all felled by arrows. Grik bled out, but was not to be trusted, as he was a true believer.

We will resume our quest with the aftermath of the battle.