Kingmaker: Sound of a Thousand Screams, Session 15, Part 1

In the “morning,” such as it was in Nyrissa’s eternally twilit realm, the PCs descended from their rope trick and started to plan for the next chapter of the Fable, a storm-lashed mountain.

Aakif the arcanist had gleaned from the writings stolen from Nyrissa’s study that this storm was a particularly fierce one, and in 3e/PF terms that meant one would need to make Fly checks to navigate the strong winds. However, no one, not even the arcanist who was so fond of flying, had any ranks in the skill! I told the players up front what kind of DCs they would be facing, and they began to scrounge for stacking bonuses to skills. Unfortunately there weren’t many to be had, although mass fly did provide a +8 on its own. Satampra the swashbuckler’s wand of heroism gave another +2.

They also used wind walk, which gave a bonus from maneuverability – albeit only at very slow speeds, by my reading – gave everyone resist electricity, and the swashbuckler received a stoneskin. Other buffs were of shorter durations, and were being held in reserve for the Green Lady’s final refuge.

And so the party took to the air from the faerie lake. After about 10 minutes of travel towards the tall tree in the distance, the scenery shifted, and they were suddenly there. Another 10 minutes past the tree, flying in the direction of the mountain, and the terrain shifted again. They had arrived.

The Fable

Chapter III. The Storm-Lashed Mountain

Hurricane-force winds hurled rain down upon the rocky slopes of the mountain. The stony ground was extremely painful to walk over, so much so that it was impossible for all but Satampra (with stoneskin) to move without injuring themselves. Resounding cracks of thunder threatened to split the sky open, and flashes of lightning briefly illuminated some structure further up the mountain.

The group struggled fly up the slope. They soon found they were able to gradually advance against the wind by tacking back and forth. But if the PCs thought they could make it to the final structure without a fight, they were soon disabused of that notion when Queen Nyrissa came flying down towards them, the wind at her back and an exultant look upon her beautiful face!

The Mad Nymph spoke some declaration that was lost in the raging winds, and then cast a Persistant chain lightning that zig-zagged through the party – but the effect was minimal, despite failed saves, as everyone was warded against lightning damage. Then a lightning bolt shot down from the storm and stopped next to Satampra, and began to attack him! This was a lair action, as Nyrissa called a forth “storm elemental” – a lightning elemental, basically – from the environs.

The swashbuckler wanted to advance but found himself checked by the winds, and so he attacked the elemental as a consolation prize. Aakif was blown away from the fight by a gust but was able to use Arcane Step to teleport back, then fired a Quickened enervation at the Queen (missed her very high touch AC) and caught her within the area of the no-save waves of exhaustion. Kwin the dwarven cleric was able to move against the wind, and got close enough to utter a prayer of destruction (Nyrissa saved).

Orseen the gnoll warpriest called for prayers of buffing, then used his helm of teleportation to appear on top of the Queen! She responded by banishing the gnoll to a maze, and then used a Quickened restoration to remove the exhausted condition from herself. For the lair action, jags of lightning arced down from the sky to strike the other PCs, and the storm elemental lashed out at Satampra, but their various protections against electricity and physical damage (in the swashbuckler’s case) held. Aakif managed to hold his position against the wind and cast a Quickened true strike followed by a Maximized enervation; he hit the Green Lady, but she had death ward up and was not affected. It was at this point that I decided maybe I should hold off using Nyrissa’s Legendary Actions in this scene, because it felt like the group was really struggling with the combination of a powerful foe and a punishing environment.

Far away from the storm, the gnoll was surprised to find himself standing in a gray featureless maze, his ears ringing in the sudden silence. Not really knowing what was going on, he took the opportunity to summon his battle companion – a giant two-headed raptor made of sunlight – and to apply some more combat buffs. To escape from the maze required a DC 20 Intelligence check, which was the warpriest’s dump stat. But at least he would have the help of his sunbird!

The cleric stood strong against the howling winds, and shouted a curse that brought a flame strike down upon Nyrissa’s head (she was warded against fire damage and only somewhat injured by this attack). The Queen then used the dreaded finger of death to kill Aakif. As the arcanist’s body was blown away in the storm, Satampra dodged an attack of opportunity from the elemental to charge Nyrissa – and rolled a threat! But not, crucially, with a 20, which would have triggered Briar’s vorpal ability. Nevertheless, the strike was confirmed as a critical hit that wounded the nymph terribly!

Kwin was blown back in the general direction of Aakif’s corpse, and used his dimension hop domain power to get close enough for the breath of life. Maybe that shouldn’t have worked – finger of death is a death effect, not just hit point damage, but an actual death would have derailed events for several days so I let the dice decide. The prayer brought the arcanist up to -4 hit points – alive but still unconscious.

For her action, Nyrissa fired a Quickened enervation at Satampra for 2 negative levels, and then hit him with a prismatic spray. He was struck by the green/poison ray, which prompted a saving throw vs. sudden death. And he succeeded! For the lair action, a lightning bolt struck the Queen and transported her to the final area of the Fable.

Satampra took care of the storm elemental while the cleric restored Aakif with a heal. Unfortunately the cleric did not have the spells to remove the swashbuckler’s negative levels; he would have to head into the final confrontation at -2 to most everything. Eventually Orseen – with his companion’s aid – was able to escape the maze, and after everyone was given freedom of movement and death ward, the group tacked against the wind towards the mountain’s peak.

Next: chapter IV!