Oh boy, was this one a slugfest. I’ll be honest, it blew up beyond even my expectations. But it’s good to get into a long, hard-fought battle every once in a while. Let’s get into it.
The session began with Kipth – unconscious – back in that strange hallway. He could hear the wailing sounds a little more clearly this time and was able to make out that they were wails of pain. Beginning to follow the sound, searching for the source, he didn’t get very far before his nightmare ended.
Brakken was the first member of the party to wake, so he was the first to discover that they were lying on thin but soft mattresses on the stone floor of a cell likewise carved of stone, replete with stone bars, in a small stone chamber with rough-hewn walls and a tunnel leading out on the far side. Standing by the entrance to the tunnel was a shardbinder (mind flayer, if you missed last session) that appeared to be their guard but did not seem to be paying much attention to them. Other than that, there wasn’t much to note beyond the fact that there was no light in the chamber at all and all of the party’s gear, save for the clothes they wore, was not with them.
This was of particular distress to Kipth, who, upon waking, discovered that all of his carefully hidden lockpicking tools and blades had been sewn into clothing that he had been stripped of. There is an important lesson in that. And also, before you cry ‘that’s a cheap blow, even for a DM’, be aware that, since he hadn’t specifically stated which clothes he had sewn his gear into, I had him roll for it – and he rolled a natural 1. Regardless, what it meant was that he had no mechanical means of facilitating an escape.
Recognising how weak they were all feeling (they were all on just 1 measly hit point after having woken but not fully recovered from their last fight) the party were just deciding to rest before doing anything else when another shardbinder entered through the tunnel. This one was shorter than the other, with a purple crystal hanging on a chain around its neck, and it carried a lantern-like device emitting the faintest purple glow which it used to scan each member of the party. Once it seemed satisfied with the results, it placed the lantern on its belt and took out a white orb that began to emit light, bathing the cell and chamber in its soft white glow.
And then the shardbinder bowed politely and, with some difficulty speaking through a mouth it seldom used that just so happened to be covered in constantly-writhing tentacles, it apologised for the party’s accommodations and explained that it was a security measure until their true identity as Champions of the Primordial could be established. Since the shardbinders were now satisfied the party were who they thought they were, this shardbinder, who also told them that in lieu of his basically unpronounceable name they could call him Bov, was there to bring them to a place they could rest and eat before their meeting with the High Keeper.
Not without suspicion but also lacking alternatives, the party accepted and followed Bov through a complex network of tunnels to a large, well-lit-by-floating-white-orbs room filled with pillows and with a table covered in food in the centre. There, Bov left them to rest, only interrupting once to bring the party their missing belongings.
During their time in the room, Monk meditated and asked Ruby about these creatures, but she was unfamiliar with them, and Kipth cast Goodberry in order to provide everyone sustenance, since they were far too suspicious to eat the food. But they did manage to get a long rest off, undisturbed. Shortly after it ended, Bov returned to lead them to the High Keeper.
Bov led the party through another series of tunnels to a pair of large stone doors, which opened into a massive chamber not unlike the interior of the Temple of Mists. The floor was marked by a large circle with seven holes, each of which corresponded to a carving on the walls of one of seven familiar creatures: unicorn, phoenix, bull, leviathan, tempest, zaratan, and dragon. However, the carving of the dragon had a large crack running through it.
Standing at the far end of the chamber was another shardbinder, this one clearly older, with long, ceremonial robes and jewelled rings on his tentacles. The High Keeper, Gogoloch (for short). He gestured the party forward and thus began a discussion that I shall sum up hence.
Basically, Gogoloch explained that this was indeed the temple where the staves needed to be brought and placed, which, until about seventy years ago, the keepers had thought was Oldfather’s prison. But because of the switcheroo Mithral had pulled, this was instead recognised as the location of the Primordial’s sanctuary. He also explained that the party’s quest was misguided, because without the corresponding champion, a given staff could only be retrieved from its home plane and not through a trial in an appropriate temple.
Gogoloch then told the party that the keepers could assist them with that, by providing the means to traverse the planes, but before he could elaborate a sharbinder entered the chamber and a brief telepathic conversation ensued between them and Gogoloch. The High Keeper had explained to the party that they were protected here by powerful wards, but suddenly it seemed they were under attack and the wards had been shut down through sabotage, leaving the complex vulnerable. He requested the party go with Bov to get them back up and suggested that the very fate of the world was now dependant on their success in doing so.
Following Bov through the tunnels, the party could hear sounds of fighting coming from various directions as they were joined by four shardbinder engineers. Bov explained that these four would repair the generator and it was everyone else’s task to keep them alive for long enough to do so. He also stopped once they got close and told the party that the final defenders in the chamber with the generator were dead and there were none left to face but enemies.
Kipth stepped up at this point and told the others to hang back while he scouted ahead. Knowing that they needed to get into the chamber, the plan was for him to launch a surprise attack before the others rushed in. Which actually, for a pleasant change, went off without a hitch.
Sneaking forward, Kipth determined that the large, round room with eight tunnels leading from it was occupied by five red slaad, three of whom were attacking the huge generator in the centre and the remaining two of which were just finished killing the numerous shardborn and couple of shardbinders that had been the last of the chamber’s defenders. Taking a bead on one of the three generator attackers, Kipth felled it with two arrows while his third went into the next (him being a gloomstalker/assassin, he got three attacks on this first round, all auto-criticals since his prey were surprised – his first, sneak attack alone did more than seventy points). Then he darted back down the tunnel while signalling his allies and they charged up to the entrance.
Then the fight began properly. The slaad moved forward without getting too close, holding for a counteroffensive that didn’t really pay off as it allowed Kipth and Monk to finish off the second one without it ever getting to do anything. Brakken went for a third, exchanging blows with it, while Bov protected the engineers in the back while attacking but mostly not accomplishing heaps over the course of the entire extended fight. That is, not accomplishing heaps in terms of dealing damage – his actual contribution to the fight was invaluable, as you will later see.
Regardless, the first five slaad (emphasis on first) went down with relative ease, allowing the engineers to get in place around the generator to begin their repairs. However, the party quickly became aware that more enemies were approaching, from all directions. Preparing themselves, Brakken and Bov took up places where they could best assist the engineers on the ground, while Monk climbed atop the scalding hot generator – which began fuelling him with temporary hit points every round – while Kipth put a Spike Growth in front of one of the tunnels before casting Rope Trick by the generator and climbing up to get a safe perch near the ceiling.
Then the enemies arrived. Coming out of the eight tunnels, the defenders saw three red slaad that were the same as the ones they had just defeated, three red slaad that were much larger and more fearsome, and a pair of strange creatures they had never encountered before: large, round creatures, floating twenty feet above the ground, with one massive eye in their centre above a large, toothy maw, and many eye-stalks protruding from their ball-like form. Yes, a pair of beholders (though, for the D&D veterans out there, they had neither their anti-magic cones nor their legendary actions – I’m not a monster).
The fight began with the slaad charging in, though they had to dash to close all the way (and one of them had to run right through the spike growth, shaving off a few of its hit points). They mostly focused on going for the engineers. Brakken was the only party member above any of the enemies in the initiative order, so he began to fight one of the big slaad that had gotten into his range. Then the beholders went, though their first round was largely uneventful, managing to paralyse one of the engineers with an eye beam while everyone else who was targeted made their saves. Quite luckily, in the case of Kipth, who was targeted by a telekinetic beam and managed to succeed on a Strength save (even with his -2 modifier) that would have torn him away from his rope trick and nullified his tactics for the rest of the fight, which were to pop out of the dimensional portal the spell creates that allows no magic or attacks to pass through, fire a couple of shots (mostly with advantage thanks to pack tactics, so consistently getting sneak attacks) and then hide back inside until his next round. This did work for the first half of the fight or so, but we’ll get to that later.
During the earlier part of the fight, one of the big slaad killed the paralysed engineer while it was attacked by Monk (who jumped on its back) and Kipth (who had earlier damaged it with spike growth before shooting arrows into it). Brakken continued to hack away at his big slaad, with the finally blow eventually being stolen by Kipth after Brakken did all the hard work. Bov generated Shield Guardians in the form of amethyst unicorns and mostly missed with any other attacks. The engineers were primarily targeted by the bad guys, with a second being downed relatively quickly while the beholders mostly failed to do any damage (although one did score a strong hit on Brakken). And, most importantly, the engineers also managed to slowly but consistently succeed on checks to repair the generator, even as they began to die.
Then the first big swing in the fight happened, with Monk, recognising the threat the beholders posed, decided to forget the slaad and target them instead. The closest was floating high above the ground, but close to a wall, allowing Monk to run up it and attack. In a pivotal moment he managed to stun it with stunning strike, allowing him and Kipth to finish it off before it got its next turn, even as two of the big slaad came over to attack Monk in a bid to save it. Once the beholder was dead, the big slaad focused on him, with a smaller one coming over to attack him as well. This resulted in a dangerously low on health Monk retreating to get back onto the generator before drinking a potion of invisibility and going into hiding.
Meanwhile, Brakken was targeted and struck by a ray of petrification by the other beholder. Failing both of his saves, he turned to stone. At the same time, Bov was charmed by the same beholder and upon its suggestion, dispelled Kipth’s rope trick, leaving him vulnerable for the first time in the fight. However, the charm effect did not prevent Bov from casting Greater Restoration on Brakken, bringing him back to fleshy form.
It was somewhere around here that the last surviving engineer (the third having been killed right beside the Brakken-statue and this fourth not to survive another round of combat either) succeeded on the tenth and final check and the generator sputtered back into life, ending both the charm effect on Bov and the fear effect that the beholder had put on Brakken before stoning him up (which had cost him several critical hits and was a big factor in why Brakken’s contribution to the fight wasn’t as big as it usually is, since even with him critting with a roll of 19 or 20 he didn’t score a single one this fight). This was fortuitous, since Kipth, after retreating to a corner and being pursued by two slaad because they couldn’t find Monk, was struck by a petrification ray and despite being a ranger/rogue with a really high Dex save, failed both and turned to stone. Bov, seeing this, pumped himself up with a fourth level cure wounds and ran a gauntlet of all the surviving slaad to get to him and Greater Restore him before he was brought down.
All the slaad were there to attack Bov, of course, because on the one hand, Monk was invisible and currently hiding directly beneath where the surviving beholder was wisely floating away from any walls, and on the other, Brakken, poor Brakken, was struck by a death ray from said beholder and killed instantly. However, despite it messing up his plan, Monk would not let his friend die.
To set the scene, Monk, while invisible, had consumed a healing potion and a potion of speed, granting him the effects of the Haste spell. Using his staff, Monk ran over to Brakken and Revivified him (with his extra hasted action) before running back to the beholder, now visible. Using his silver hand, he fired his spike into the beholder and climbed up the rope (having just enough movement to do so, again, thanks to haste – and, obviously, being a monk) to get within range. And then, with his final two attacks, he got incredibly lucky and scored not one but two critical hits, massively injuring the beholder before finishing it off on his next turn.
After being revivified, Brakken was attacked by the one surviving big slaad, but even with advantage it missed twice with three attacks and Brakken’s relentless endurance kicked in to save him on the third. He attacked it back, but then Monk killed the beholder, causing it and the two surviving smaller slaad to flee (running into other shardbinders coming to reinforce and quickly being finished off off-screen, so to speak). Monk and Kipth both provided healing to Bov before he bled out and with that, the fight – and the session, since we’d run late – was over.
That was a big one, ladies and gentlemen, with some serious twists and turns. I know that there were a couple of moments that really worried the party – Brakken getting petrified being the main one, since they had no idea that Bov could cast Greater Restoration at the time. Also, with Brakken being played by our regular DM (who knows the monster manual backwards), I could just about hear his stomach hit his throat when I revealed not one, but two beholders. But they pulled through it, with much aplomb.
I think MVP has to go to Monk. Between nobly revivifying Brakken and being the point man on taking out both beholders, he had an incredible fight. Plus, his use of potions to do something other than heal was both incredibly clever and something we don’t often see during out combats. And to cap it all off, I’m so incredibly proud that his silver hand, a magic item that was envisioned and created entirely by the players, because of decisions made by the players, was used to facilitate such an important (and cool – the most important thing of all) moment that otherwise wouldn’t have been possible.
We’ll pick up right where we left off next session. However, that won’t be for two weeks, since we won’t be able to play on the coming weekend thanks to former commitments. So, make sure you tune in in two weeks to see the full aftermath of the fight and just what other exciting craziness will be coming next.