Post by David on Aug 15, 2011 17:27:59 GMT -5
The morning of the 3rd, Mikhail psionically teleported himself and Saanau to Klarr where they spoke with and gained a moment spell from the Green Witch, Esmerelda, in exchange for some spells from the Violet Witch, Saanau.
Saanau then cast teleport and brought the pair to the ancient stone circle of Tovag Baragu. There, they arrived to see Black Robe and his allies battling for their lives against strange, multi-eyed fish with hummingbird wings. One bite from these beasties slowly turned the victim to stone and other than Black Robe, Lowdog, and Aris, all the rest of the guardians of Tovag Baragu had been transformed into statuary...
Mikhail and Saanau helped out and bought Black Robe time to cure the petrification process for himself and then later both Mikhail and Aris.
The shaman agrees to raise Maedhros but needed additional magical support in Amberwood. He left Mikhail and Saanau to support Lowdog and his followers, Tomkin, the giant eagle and, Xiang, the werebear as well as Aris Tradewind. Naturally, this is where things went a bit screwy...
Black Robe had warned the group that for the last week or so, Vertigo had redoubled her efforts at throwing random creatures through the gates. Not a half hour after the shaman left, over a half dozen hawkmen armed with obsidian knives as well as well over a dozen 8' tall bunny-men came through portals on opposite sides of the inner set of stone lintels. Saanau responded with a fireball which did amazing damage but did not slay the bunnymen. Mikhail's wall of fire proved more effective at heding out the hawkmen and only four survived and entered Oerth. Lowdog invoked his green jade pendant, calling for help, and ten gorilla men stepped through more lintels... Aris launched a fire rain on the bunny men and Saanau did another fireball this time catching the stone circle itself... That's when all hell broke loose...
Suddenly, in addition to a few hawkmen and over a dozen smoking-and-blacked bunnymen, the heroes were now Astral. This proved helpful to the heroes as the bunnymen had no idea how to deal with the situation. The gorilla-men were fine. More spells finish off most of the critters, but Saanau decides to peer through the various lintels which could still be seen on the Astral plane, though the rest of Oerth and their home reality was gone. Unfortunately, the elven mage misjudged (or was tricked?) and got too near to the event-horizon of one gate and disappeared. Under orders from Lowdog, the apes followed. The lintels of Tovag Baragu then vanished, stranding the party on the Astral plane!
After the fight, Mikhail offered to plane shift back to the Prime, but couldn't bring everyone. He took Aris and the giant eagle, leaving Lowdog and the werebear stranded on the Silver Plane. The young psi materialized on the plains three miles south of Tovag Baragu and Aris used his carpet to bring them back to the stone circle.
An hour later, Black Robe arrived. Maedhros was now alive in Amberwood, but recovering from his time as a corpse. Black Robe would need a day of rest to heal him. The shaman covered Tovag Baragu while Mikhail regained his strength and then the young psi teleported back to the edge of the black ice glacier where he gathered up Daj, Cliffy, Helga Hushpuppy, and Moonlight to guard the stone circle while the shaman rested.
A few hours later, a little after midday, three tumbleweeds rolled through a gate. Daj tried to speak with them, but they just attacked the party. The half-dryad would have died had she not dimension doored free of their thorny, acidic tendrils. As it was, Helga nearly died and it was only Daj's ring and Moonlight's hold plant spells which turned the tide of the battle.
In the early evening, two albino, bipedal komodo dragons came through the gate. Daj began to attempt to parley when the melee began. Moonlight's sun dazzle blinded one, but the other unleashed a psionic blast that flattened Daj and Jamal (who was trying to protect the silly girl!). The creatures manifested a magical defensive field which thwarted Cliffy's attempts at backstabbing as well as most of Helga's assaults. The creatures didn't seem to like Moonlight, but he was able to resist their magical assaults. Before the lizards were defeated, one did manage to telekinetically use Helga as a battering ram and as another point, the dwarf-turned-80-pound-hobbit tried to body-chuck the 300 lbs lizard with a force field, only to hurt her own nose in the process.
A short time after sunset three fish arrived from a volcanic world. They quickly began to cool on Oerth, dying. The heroes did take them out fairly quickly and they chilled into ornate mineral structures of coppery and golden ores in the shape of fish, complete with internal organs...!
Just a few moments later, nine reddish lobster creatures, mi-go, arrived through a gate and attacked. The heroes made VERY
short work of the lobster men and slept through the night until the morning without incident.
Around 9am on the 4th, the gate opened again and this time Vertigo herself came through. Whatever force previously bound her to Celene had clearly weakened enough for her to journey to within the inner circle of stones...
She mesmerized Moonlight and set to work stabbing Dajamira with her venomous scorpion tail and poisonous bite. The half-dryad fell with broken ribs and a pint of toxin in her blood... The rest of the heroes didn't fair much better. Mikhail managed a strike with his scimitar after his psionic powers proved useless, but got poisoned for his troubles. Cliffy unleashed a powerful and VERY effective wizard's wrath on the cobrasaurus, but was transformed into a weasel for his troubles. Helga saved Daj, and did a prayer before then trying to go toe-to-toe with the Goddess of Insanity and Ill Fortune. Vertigo mostly ignored the hobbit. Moonlight started turning sticks to snakes and the cumulative effect of these foes gave the heroes a chance...
Daj hasted Helga and Moonlight as well as many of the snakes. Helga got in a flurry of strikes and broke Vertigo's right claw. A second waves of snakes joined the first and the goddess was in trouble. She teleported away, appearing back through the gate in the ruins of Azura on the moon. Before Helga could reach her, though, Vertigo closed the gate...
An hour later, Black Robe returned with a now-healed Maedhros as well as Moorak Drake and his daughter, Robyndella. The heroes were to guard Tovag Baragu further while the shaman and saint rescued first Lowdog and then Saanau.
Lowdog was easy, with a few simple spells from the shaman solving the problem. Maedhros cast crystalomancy to give an idea where the elf was while Moorak read his mind and trusted to his luck. He then teleported without error between worlds and found the hapless elf wizardess...
...for her part, Saanau had run through the lintels with the ten gorilla men and a single bunnyman on her heels. She appeared in a place of unimaginable cold, in a snowbank, on top of a glacier. The gate was mostly buried in the ice. Saanau used a magic missile to make short work of the bunnyman and the gorillas disappeared after the gate closed. Saanau then set about digging herself a spot amid the cold to wait for rescue.
For about an hour she enjoyed the trailing edge of one of Moonlight's resist cold spells. She used this time to construct a snow fort to maintain her heat. It didn't do much good. And visibility was non-existent in the blizzard-like conditions above...
For more than half a day, Saanau kept somewhat warm. Her continual light stone attracted the attention of a yeti, but a single volley of magic missiles slew one and drove the rest off. After nearly another half day, the elf noticed her arms had turned a dead-white and emaciated, much like frozen, rotting meat. The sting of the cold hurt less and many more hours passed before she hear a voice...Moorak had arrived with the others to rescue her!
Maedhros took one look at Saanau and his feelings turned to hatred and rage. Mikhail tried to calm him and Moorak to restrain him while he attempted to turn Saanau! The Baron got Maedhros to accept an item spell at Mikhail's suggestion. The boy then explained that he could feel Maedhros' mind had come unhinged. Moorak countered that Maedhros' insanity had already been cured, but Mikhail suggested his own original mentor might be able to achieve what magic could not. Either way, without further aid, Maedhros might be a larger threat to himself and his party than he realizes...
Moorak and his companions explored a little while the Saint waited for his magic to return so he could again teleport back to Oerth...
...That leaves at LEAST one and a half days of portal duty for the rest of the party AND what to do with Maedhros when they get back...?
Saanau then cast teleport and brought the pair to the ancient stone circle of Tovag Baragu. There, they arrived to see Black Robe and his allies battling for their lives against strange, multi-eyed fish with hummingbird wings. One bite from these beasties slowly turned the victim to stone and other than Black Robe, Lowdog, and Aris, all the rest of the guardians of Tovag Baragu had been transformed into statuary...
Mikhail and Saanau helped out and bought Black Robe time to cure the petrification process for himself and then later both Mikhail and Aris.
The shaman agrees to raise Maedhros but needed additional magical support in Amberwood. He left Mikhail and Saanau to support Lowdog and his followers, Tomkin, the giant eagle and, Xiang, the werebear as well as Aris Tradewind. Naturally, this is where things went a bit screwy...
Black Robe had warned the group that for the last week or so, Vertigo had redoubled her efforts at throwing random creatures through the gates. Not a half hour after the shaman left, over a half dozen hawkmen armed with obsidian knives as well as well over a dozen 8' tall bunny-men came through portals on opposite sides of the inner set of stone lintels. Saanau responded with a fireball which did amazing damage but did not slay the bunnymen. Mikhail's wall of fire proved more effective at heding out the hawkmen and only four survived and entered Oerth. Lowdog invoked his green jade pendant, calling for help, and ten gorilla men stepped through more lintels... Aris launched a fire rain on the bunny men and Saanau did another fireball this time catching the stone circle itself... That's when all hell broke loose...
Suddenly, in addition to a few hawkmen and over a dozen smoking-and-blacked bunnymen, the heroes were now Astral. This proved helpful to the heroes as the bunnymen had no idea how to deal with the situation. The gorilla-men were fine. More spells finish off most of the critters, but Saanau decides to peer through the various lintels which could still be seen on the Astral plane, though the rest of Oerth and their home reality was gone. Unfortunately, the elven mage misjudged (or was tricked?) and got too near to the event-horizon of one gate and disappeared. Under orders from Lowdog, the apes followed. The lintels of Tovag Baragu then vanished, stranding the party on the Astral plane!
After the fight, Mikhail offered to plane shift back to the Prime, but couldn't bring everyone. He took Aris and the giant eagle, leaving Lowdog and the werebear stranded on the Silver Plane. The young psi materialized on the plains three miles south of Tovag Baragu and Aris used his carpet to bring them back to the stone circle.
An hour later, Black Robe arrived. Maedhros was now alive in Amberwood, but recovering from his time as a corpse. Black Robe would need a day of rest to heal him. The shaman covered Tovag Baragu while Mikhail regained his strength and then the young psi teleported back to the edge of the black ice glacier where he gathered up Daj, Cliffy, Helga Hushpuppy, and Moonlight to guard the stone circle while the shaman rested.
A few hours later, a little after midday, three tumbleweeds rolled through a gate. Daj tried to speak with them, but they just attacked the party. The half-dryad would have died had she not dimension doored free of their thorny, acidic tendrils. As it was, Helga nearly died and it was only Daj's ring and Moonlight's hold plant spells which turned the tide of the battle.
In the early evening, two albino, bipedal komodo dragons came through the gate. Daj began to attempt to parley when the melee began. Moonlight's sun dazzle blinded one, but the other unleashed a psionic blast that flattened Daj and Jamal (who was trying to protect the silly girl!). The creatures manifested a magical defensive field which thwarted Cliffy's attempts at backstabbing as well as most of Helga's assaults. The creatures didn't seem to like Moonlight, but he was able to resist their magical assaults. Before the lizards were defeated, one did manage to telekinetically use Helga as a battering ram and as another point, the dwarf-turned-80-pound-hobbit tried to body-chuck the 300 lbs lizard with a force field, only to hurt her own nose in the process.
A short time after sunset three fish arrived from a volcanic world. They quickly began to cool on Oerth, dying. The heroes did take them out fairly quickly and they chilled into ornate mineral structures of coppery and golden ores in the shape of fish, complete with internal organs...!
Just a few moments later, nine reddish lobster creatures, mi-go, arrived through a gate and attacked. The heroes made VERY
short work of the lobster men and slept through the night until the morning without incident.
Around 9am on the 4th, the gate opened again and this time Vertigo herself came through. Whatever force previously bound her to Celene had clearly weakened enough for her to journey to within the inner circle of stones...
She mesmerized Moonlight and set to work stabbing Dajamira with her venomous scorpion tail and poisonous bite. The half-dryad fell with broken ribs and a pint of toxin in her blood... The rest of the heroes didn't fair much better. Mikhail managed a strike with his scimitar after his psionic powers proved useless, but got poisoned for his troubles. Cliffy unleashed a powerful and VERY effective wizard's wrath on the cobrasaurus, but was transformed into a weasel for his troubles. Helga saved Daj, and did a prayer before then trying to go toe-to-toe with the Goddess of Insanity and Ill Fortune. Vertigo mostly ignored the hobbit. Moonlight started turning sticks to snakes and the cumulative effect of these foes gave the heroes a chance...
Daj hasted Helga and Moonlight as well as many of the snakes. Helga got in a flurry of strikes and broke Vertigo's right claw. A second waves of snakes joined the first and the goddess was in trouble. She teleported away, appearing back through the gate in the ruins of Azura on the moon. Before Helga could reach her, though, Vertigo closed the gate...
An hour later, Black Robe returned with a now-healed Maedhros as well as Moorak Drake and his daughter, Robyndella. The heroes were to guard Tovag Baragu further while the shaman and saint rescued first Lowdog and then Saanau.
Lowdog was easy, with a few simple spells from the shaman solving the problem. Maedhros cast crystalomancy to give an idea where the elf was while Moorak read his mind and trusted to his luck. He then teleported without error between worlds and found the hapless elf wizardess...
...for her part, Saanau had run through the lintels with the ten gorilla men and a single bunnyman on her heels. She appeared in a place of unimaginable cold, in a snowbank, on top of a glacier. The gate was mostly buried in the ice. Saanau used a magic missile to make short work of the bunnyman and the gorillas disappeared after the gate closed. Saanau then set about digging herself a spot amid the cold to wait for rescue.
For about an hour she enjoyed the trailing edge of one of Moonlight's resist cold spells. She used this time to construct a snow fort to maintain her heat. It didn't do much good. And visibility was non-existent in the blizzard-like conditions above...
For more than half a day, Saanau kept somewhat warm. Her continual light stone attracted the attention of a yeti, but a single volley of magic missiles slew one and drove the rest off. After nearly another half day, the elf noticed her arms had turned a dead-white and emaciated, much like frozen, rotting meat. The sting of the cold hurt less and many more hours passed before she hear a voice...Moorak had arrived with the others to rescue her!
Maedhros took one look at Saanau and his feelings turned to hatred and rage. Mikhail tried to calm him and Moorak to restrain him while he attempted to turn Saanau! The Baron got Maedhros to accept an item spell at Mikhail's suggestion. The boy then explained that he could feel Maedhros' mind had come unhinged. Moorak countered that Maedhros' insanity had already been cured, but Mikhail suggested his own original mentor might be able to achieve what magic could not. Either way, without further aid, Maedhros might be a larger threat to himself and his party than he realizes...
Moorak and his companions explored a little while the Saint waited for his magic to return so he could again teleport back to Oerth...
...That leaves at LEAST one and a half days of portal duty for the rest of the party AND what to do with Maedhros when they get back...?