Aboleth Group - "Derrick's God is Derrick" - Session 20 - LMOP

20^th Feb 2020, 7:15 – 11:00pm

In-game timeline: Start of session, day 26 (1489DR Eleint 19). End of session, day 26 (1489DR Eleint 19).

Our “Heroes” are keen to investigate the mine and eventually they decide to actually climb into the pit and follow Derrick. There is a slight orange glow from the north-west tunnel and the group decide to head towards the light.

The tunnel leads into a network of mined tunnels, some leading to seeming dead ends, others going off to the east. The dim light grows stronger to the north and the party press on, eventually discovering the source of the light – some orange, fluorescent fungus lining the walls of a tunnel. Derrick proceeds to eat some, on the basis that Esme *thinks* that it *might not* be deadly. Derrick wouldn’t last very long in the wild.

Luckily, at least for Derrick, the fungus isn’t poisonous, though it does cause everything that comes into contact with it to glow. So Derrick ended up with glowing hands and a glowing mouth. Very stealthy. Mallorn offered to remove the clown-look with a cast of prestidigitation and all was well once again. Esme decided to scrape a load more of the fungus into her backpack, so she now has a backpack full of orange glowing items.

The corridor led to a cavern containing a large pool, maybe about 20 foot deep. Whilst Mallorn and Esme seemed distracted when entering the cavern, Derrick and Pruni checked out the water – it was salty – and the cavern – it had a single other exit, though the water seemed to flow out of an underground tunnel somewhere.

When Mallorn stopped staring into nothing, he suddenly waded into the water and swam out to the deeper part of the pool and dove down, seemingly searching for something. Whatever he found seemed to be beyond his strength to obtain, and he asked for help from Derrick, who dutifully dove down and lifted some of the heavier rocks out of the way. Mallorn emerged with a skeleton, possibly an elf, wearing two rings and grasping a wand of some sort. Mallorn spent some time building a makeshift grave for the ancient skeleton, out of rocks and shells by the pool shore, and said a prayer over it before the group moved on.

The exit led up some stairs, to a crossroads and a door. Mallorn sent Geoff a-scouting beyond the door, where he spotted 5 bugbears having a bit of R&R. The door in the opposite wall seemed to be barred from the inside, quite solidly, so the only exit out of that room appeared to be the one that the party were standing right outside. So when a couple of bugbears seemed to be rising to exit the room, the party panicked!

And ran away. Not back the way they came, to a place they knew was safe. Oh no. That just wouldn’t do. Instead they ran blindly away down a corridor they hadn’t explored before, running towards a well lit doorway with some double doors, and proceeded to burst into the room beyond the doors and quickly shut the doors behind them. At that point they thought they’d better look round to see where they had ended up…..

…. And realised that 5 bugbears may have been an easier option. The room contained 2 bugbears, 4 giant spiders (not all of which were immediately visible) and a female drow brandishing a staff, who they rightly thought was probably the long-expected Nezznar, the Black Spider. Things did not look all that promising, especially as Mallorn and Esme seemed to be staring into space for the first few seconds after entering.

Having to act quickly, Pruni was quick off the mark. Making good use of her Assassinate ability, she managed to fire off a rapid crossbow bolt at Nezznar, and scored a hit! Her assassination skills ensured she did considerable damage from her single bolt. The giant spiders responded by successfully encasing Derrick, Mallorn and Esme in tight webbing, making it difficult to move, whilst Pruni did ‘her usual’ and found a place to hide.

Derrick reacted next, managed to break out of the webbing pretty quickly, and decided to use his Action Surge ability to cast Chromatic Orb at Nezznar, hoping to take the drow down before she had a chance to act at all. The plan worked perfectly – especially as Derrick managed to score a critical hit on Nezznar (with, I think, the help of his inspiration), and she did indeed fall to the ground, encompassed by the flames from the burning orb, before she realised what was happening.

With the main enemy out of the picture, the party thought it may be plain sailing from here on. But the remaining creatures had other ideas, and the threat of other bugbears maybe hearing the sounds of battle and joining in was always on the party’s minds.

Mallorn used one of his seemingly never-ending supply of spell slots to fire off four Magic Missile bolts at one of the spiders, guaranteeing some significant damage despite still being restrained by the webbing. He was rewarded, however, by one of the bugbears running over to him and smashing him in the arm with a morning star – even his spells were not able to help him dodge that one. Esme managed to break out of her webbing, and was able to follow up with a Spiritual Weapon hitting the second bugbear.

Pruni then began her worst period of attacks that she has even endured. Her usual tactic of appearing from the shadows, firing off a crossbow bolt, and then hiding again, was attempted again and again but, despite managing to hide well every time, the crossbow bolts went wide of their mark every time. Having helped take down the drow in the first few seconds, Pruni’s attacks proved ineffectual for some time afterwards.

Meanwhile the spiders moved in to attack those who were proving more effective with their attacks. Mallorn managed to use shield to protect himself from a spider bite, but Derrick took a poisonous bite on his shoulder which put him off his stride and he missed his next attack. Mallorn tried unsuccessfully to attack his webbing with a ray of frost, and remained restrained. A bugbear took another swipe at Derrick and connected, and another hit Mallorn, who burnt another of his infinite spell slots to use shield to dodge the attack. Esme decided the party needed all the help it could get, and cast Aid on herself, Derrick and Mallorn to boost their health, then took another swipe at the bugbear with her Spiritual Weapon and connected.

While Pruni fired off crossbow bolts randomly, hitting walls, the spiders got more bites on Derrick and Mallorn, injecting poison into the wounds. Esme got hit by more webbing, pinning her down. Derrick missed and Mallorn fired another Magic Missile at a spider for more damage, but not enough to bring it down. He got a Morningstar in his back for his trouble from one of the bugbears, the other managed to swing wide of Derrick. Esme cast her Sacred Flame at one of the bugbears, which it didn’t manage to dodge, and followed up with her Spiritual Weapon, which this time missed.

Pruni fired at the ceiling, and the spiders responded with a hit on Esme and webbing Derrick again. Mallorn was bitten again and the injected poison took him down, unconscious. Derrick immediately broke out of the webbing only to be hit by a bugbear’s swing – he quickly cast Shield to avoid the blow. Esme now had a bugbear on her, as it had moved away from the unconscious Mallorn. It swung its great Morningstar at the restrained Esme and scored a critical hit! She managed to survive the damage, but only just, and was forced to Channel Divinity to restore some health to her, as well as to bring Mallorn out of his unconscious state and back in the fight.

Pruni fired a bolt into the floor between her legs, and hid again. Esme, having just regained some health, immediately lost some again when a spider bit her. Luckily her Dwarvish resistance to poison helped her reduce the damage taken and she survived. Derrick, getting a little fed up at not being able to kill anything for a while, landed an axe blow on the bugbear hitting him and scored a crit – taking the bugbear down and proving that they could be killed! He then used his Second Wind to recover a bit of health before facing more foes. Mallorn, now back in the fray, missed with his Fire Bolt, but the last remaining bugbear missed his attack on Esme too, though her response was also a miss, as was her Spiritual Weapon strike.

With the four spiders still alive, one managed to bite Derrick, but once again he dodged with a Shield spell. Unfortunately another managed to sink its teeth into Esme’s leg, piercing an artery and she went down, bleeding out. Derrick missed with his greataxe, but Mallorn used his last spell slot (oh, hang on, still more slots free…) to fire a Magic Missile at second level, with two bolts at the last remaining bugbear, and two at one of the spiders. Both went down, and Mallorn basked in the brief glory of a double-kill!

With Esme slowly bleeding out on the floor, Pruni finally managed to land a hit on one of the remaining spiders! Woo Hoo! The spider was pissed off though, and immediately bit Mallorn, taking him down for the second time in the battle, and leaving just Pruni and Derrick fighting the last three spiders.

Derrick landed a hit on one of the spiders, and Pruni decided that saving the healer may be a better option than risking a wild attack, and she got a healing potion down Esme’s neck, bringing her back up. Unfortunately Pruni’s luck ran out on the stealth rolls, though, and she remained in full view of the spiders – something she is really not used to! She was immediately attacked and bitten, taking significant damage and very nearly joining Mallorn and falling unconscious. Derrick was hit again by two spider bites, and was grateful of his regained health a little while earlier – he managed to remain standing and retaliated by hitting ‘his’ spider once again. Mallorn was still bleeding on the floor but Esme figured that Derrick needed healing more than Mallorn at this point and used Healing Word to ensure Derrick was able to remain standing a little while longer. Pruni downed a potion of healing to restore some of her health, and tried to disengage from the spider, in the vain hope that it wouldn’t run after her. Unfortunately it did run after her, but luckily it missed its attack, as did its last two remaining friends. Derrick, buoyed by their poor attacks this time landed a hit on his weakened spider and brought it down! Only two more spiders to go – though these were still at almost full health.

With Mallorn still bleeding out on the floor, Esme cast another Healing Word at Mallorn, bringing him back up. Pruni, resigned to no longer being able to hide, scored a hit on the spider attacking her, but received another bite in response – though the healing she received from the potion managed to keep her alive. The other spider managed to encase Mallorn in webbing again, and Derrick missed his attack, as did Mallorn and Esme, who was saving her last 2^nd level spell slot for some healing.

Everyone was a bit exhausted at this point and there were many missed swings and bites. Mallorn, still stuck in a web, fired off three Magic Missile bolts at one of the spiders, and Esme followed it up with Sacred Flame. Pruni did her usual at this point and stepped in to take the glory of the kill after everyone else had done the hard work, bringing the spider down. She didn’t wait for the applause, though - she took her opportunity to hide again.

The last remaining spider scored another hit on Derrick, almost taking him down, and he was forced to take a healing potion in response. Mallorn failed to escape his bonds and Esme cast another Healing Word on Derrick in the hope he would survive long enough to take out the last spider.

The healing was well-timed, as the spider scored another hit on Derrick, who stayed on his feet, but was put off enough to miss his retaliation. Mallorn managed to finally escape his webbing and Esme managed to hit the spider with her Sacred Flame. Pruni finally connected with her blow and reduced the health of the last spider significantly, which must have distracted it, as it missed with its next attack on Derrick. Derrick took his opportunity and went in for the final blow – using his new (“stolen”, according to Esme) springy boots to leap up and come crashing down on the spiders head, splitting it in two, and spilling spider-brains (such as they are) all over the floor.

The fight was over! They had survived. Just.

With Mallorn down twice (giving him 2 levels of exhaustion – he is now slow and rubbish at ability checks), and Esme down once (giving her a single level of exhaustion - she is equally bad at ability checks now), and all spell slots used (though I’m sure Mallorn has a few ‘extras’ hidden away somewhere!) and class abilities all spent, the party is in dire need of a rest – ideally a long one. However, they decide to spend some time looting this obviously ancient, religious sanctuary.

Esme uses Prayer of Healing to restore some of their health, whilst Mallorn Identifies a couple of the objects they have found. Esme found a staff on Nezznar, as well as her spellbook, a potion of healing and an iron key in the shape of an anvil. Mallorn searches the table in the room and finds an ancient, Dwarven key, a letter to Nezznar, and a book detailing the workings of the Forge of Spells, as well as some gemstones and some gold.

While those two were distracted, Derrick and Pruni study the large statue of a Dwarven God, which Mallorn and Esme both recognise as Dumathoin, the Dwarven God of mining, carved against the wall. The eyes seem to be made of a green gemstone. Derrick immediately decides to desecrate the statue by climbing up and prying out a gemstone. He tries to get the other one, but fails. Mallorn looks up to see this activity and is very disappointed, though perhaps not surprised, at the sacrilege going on. Esme senses that her God, Marthammor Duin, is equally unhappy at the violation. Pruni declares that “Derrick’s God is Derrick” and Derrick confirms this by praying to himself as he pockets the large, green gem,

Esme somehow seems to have some knowledge of the statue and proceeds to approach the massive handle of the warhammer it is holding, and twists it. Unfortunately her knowledge is only partial, and she immediately takes some damage from the large needles that shoot out from the handle and pierce her skin. A lesson learned, she turns it the other way. This is more successful, and a stone door in the carved throne, between the legs of the stone Dwarf, opens up to reveal a hidden cavity, containing a chest.

Pushing the others out of the way, Esme pulls out the chest and tries to open it. Unfortunately it is locked, so she calls Pruni over to try to pick the lock. After a number of unsuccessful attempts, Pruni eventually manages to open the chest, to reveal a number of gemstones, and a small figurine of the statue’s warhammer, seemingly made from pure silver.

And so we leave our ‘Heroes’, busy looting a temple and defacing Dwarven religious symbology, surrounded by dead spiders, bugbears and a drow, with the expectation that at any moment 5 bugbears may appear through the door. Or something else from the rest of the mine that they haven’t explored yet. Despite coming through a difficult battle, I’ve a feeling they are not yet out of danger!