Rise of the Runelords Recap # 76 [RPG]

[7 Calistril 4708 continued]

Having penetrated to the very depths of Jorgenfist and into a structure clearly dating to the days of ancient Thassilon, the adventurers cautiously explore their surroundings.  It’s clear that even the powerful preservative magicks imbued in the stonework have started to fail, as many passageways are choked with rubble.  Oddly enough, the places where the walls meet the floors and ceilings have been smoothed away and rounded, leaving not a single corner or hard angle visible.

With Yuzo taking the lead, the adventurers move into a room almost nauseating in its flickering dimensions!  To Yuzo and Jinkatsyu, it looks like the room is starting to grow, but the others realize the truth: they’re being shrunk!  From out of the shadows an obese hill giant whose body is covered with scars in the shape of Thassilonian runes charges forth with unnatural speed, his overdeveloped muscles bulging against his seemingly too-tight skin!  Once again, Kang and Salma’s fireworks save the day.  When the smoke clears, Salma remembers reading in a crumbling manuscript about creatures called Runeslaves—giants fleshwarped by Thassilonian magic into powerful but short-lived servants.

Natives of the Elemental Plane of Fire, 

forgefiends are attracted to metal and gemstones.

Jinkatsyu and Kang start looking at a pair of stone doors to the southern part of the chamber when another threat suddenly manifests.  A massive iron-skinned fiend whose short arms and razor sharp claws seem friendly compared to the massive, fire-filled maw that splits its belly in two!  It seems to glide right out of the stonework, but Kang’s special concussive bomb knocks it on its back, and Jinkatsyu and Yuzo are able to destroy it before it can even get to its feet.

Thick, acrid smoke pours forth from an immense, twelve-foot tall cauldron in the next chamber that causes Jinkatsyu and Yuzo to double over, retching.  A hulking brute with a skull-like face and glowing blue runes carved into its forehead stands sentry.  Salma identifies it as a stone golem, and knows that her magic can’t affect it.  But nothing stops Kang’s bombs, and although Yuzo is battered by the golem’s attacks, it soon crumbles under the force of repeated concussive blasts.  Using Yuzo’s magic decanter, Kang douses the flames under the cauldron and puts an end to the smoke.  Yuzo is in favour of a strategic retreat, but Kang’s confidence persuades the group that they should continue forth.

Those slain in battle by the Headless Lord 

rise minutes later as zombies!

Following the worked stone passageway to the east, the adventurers come across a chamber containing a dozen preserved bodies of ogres, trolls, and hill giants, all wearing suits of armor and staged as if rallying for war.  As the group starts to pass between them, five of the corpses suddenly animate and attack, led by a headless zombie lord!  Yuzo and Jinkatsyu are affected by its uncanny presence and flee in mortal terror, but Salma manifests arcing chains of fire to devastate the lesser undead, while Ava’s column of holy fire and Kang’s bombs finish off the leader just as it’s trying to summon more zombies to battle.  Salma remembers hearing a tale of such headless zombies: that their maker can carry the head around with them and “see” what the body sees!  Have the adventurers been spied on by Mokmurian during the battle?

After tracking down Yuzo and Jinkatsyu (who fled into darkness), the adventurers continue on.  They’ve taken the best Mokmurian has to offer and have barely broken a sweat!

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Director's Commentary

This was one of those sessions that was just combat after combat, as all the rooms leading up to Mokmurian contained a different threat.  The AP did a good job detailing each of them and making them interesting and unique, but the PCs just completely wrecked their foes.  Often I'd spend 45 minutes in prep getting the encounter for one of these villains ready, only to have them go down like chumps after a round or two at the table!  Some of them, like the forgefiend, I would like to see or use in other campaigns.

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