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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 8328011" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 37: PUTTING THE "MORTAL" IN THE QUEEN</strong></p><p></p><p>PC Roster:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Cramer Appleknocker, gnome cleric 12</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Jhasspok, lizardman 3/barbarian 3/fighter 6</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Khari Hammerslammer, dwarf fighter 12</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Marlo Pendragon, human sorcerer 12</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Utred "Buckets" Butterflinger, dwarf barbarian 12</p><p></p><p>Game Session Date: 30 June 2021</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>"We're almost there," Dh'aeve told the others.</p><p></p><p><strong>Dh'aeve Falmakyorl</strong> sat at the helm powering the spelljamming vessel and keeping it in flight. After the invasion of the surface world had ended up with some surprising reversals - not least of which was the sudden crashing of two of the flying ships filled with <em>contagion</em>-laden slaves when their pilots apparently abandoned their helms in mid-flight - the Mortal Queen had made some immediate changes. First of all, each vessel now required a backup pilot standing by at all times to take over the helm should something happen to the primary pilot. These ships were expensive, not easily replaced, and were the only means by which the Mortal Queen, Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior, would lead 300 of her most loyal followers to a new world, abandoning this one to the Dying One - whose return to the Material Plane would likely lay waste to the entire planet.</p><p></p><p>This edict applied to all drow spelljamming vessels, even the flagship, which the Mortal Queen entrusted none to pilot but herself. Standing beside her was <strong>Matron Falmakyorl</strong>, leader of the Second House of Overreach, Falmakyorl being the Noble House responsible for the Overreach Navy. Unknown to the Mortal Queen, Matron Falmakyorl was a drow purist who despised Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior's half-fiend nature, viewing her as unfit to be a House Matron let alone the self-professed Queen of the Drow. She was currently under a <em>Rary's telepathic bond</em> spell linking her to her nephew, Dh'aeve, and filling him in on everything going on in the vicinity of the flagship's magical helm. As far as the Mortal Queen was aware, Matron Falmakyorl's presence there was merely as her backup pilot should she need to replace Llolnida at the spelljamming helm; she had no idea the House Matron was equally willing to relieve her of her duties as Queen of the Drow and step into that role as well.</p><p></p><p>Dh'aeve was piloting his own ship to rendezvous with the flagship, for the Mortal Queen had summoned the entire remaining fleet to her, floating over the mountains to the northwest of hated Greenvale. The surface city of expatriate drow had survived the recent attack, in no small part due to the alliances made with their surface-world neighbors. Standing on the ship's open deck were the five former arena slaves of House Jalamir, now free citizens of Overreach's Third House and the ones responsible for many of those alliances. A small group of drow soldiers stood among them, although a <em>veil</em> spell cast upon the five heroes by the Archmage Xiandria Jalamir gave them each the appearance of a drow as well. The original plan was for the smaller vessel to get within boarding distance of the flagship, at which time all ten passengers would leap aboard and the real drow soldiers would keep the Mortal Queen's drow allies at bay on board the flagship's main deck while the heroes fought their way into the back room of the vessel, giving them a chance to take out the Mortal Queen as she sat at the ship's helm.</p><p></p><p>However, as Dh'aeve brought his ship into position, the heroes greatly altered the plan. Getting information directly from Matron Falmakyorl herself over the telepathic link, it seemed a much better approach was for Cramer to <em>teleport</em> the group directly to the Mortal Queen's helm room - that way, there would be only the Mortal Queen and her two bodyguards, her own trusted niece and nephew, to contend with - Matron Falmakyorl would be there as well, of course, but she would not raise a finger in the protection of her alleged superior. Best of all, as the helm of the flagship was in an enclosed room in the back of the vessel, nobody would see the heroes' attack but those inside the room with them.</p><p></p><p>"It'd be even better if you cast a <em>silence</em> spell on me," suggested Utred. "That way, none of them would be able to cast any spells."</p><p></p><p>"The Mortal Queen can't cast any spells in any case," pointed out Cramer. "Powering a spelljamming helm drains the pilot of the ability to cast spells for a full 24 hours." Dh'aeve acknowledged that this was true. "And anyway, if I cast a <em>silence</em> spell on you, then I can't cast the <em>teleport</em> spell and bring you along with, which defeats the whole purpose."</p><p></p><p>"So cast it on me after we show up in the room with her," Utred argued.</p><p></p><p>"We'll want to <em>teleport</em> in and hit them hard and fast before they have much of a chance to react," Marlo countered. "However...." An idea had suddenly popped into her head. She unfolded the <em>bag of holding</em> in which the group stored their communal property. "What if we cast the <em>silence</em> spell on you and then you hopped into the bag? I could hold the opening shut long enough for us to <em>teleport</em> over, then open it as soon as we got there and you could pop out. The silent effect would only affect the bag's interior while you were inside, so Cramer could still cast his spell to get us over there...."</p><p></p><p>"I like it!" enthused the gnome.</p><p></p><p>"But what about us?" asked the leader of the small band of drow soldiers who had planned on storming the deck of the flagship.</p><p></p><p>"New plan," Cramer informed them. "Dh'aeve pilots us into position - anywhere I can get a good view of the doors to the flagship's helm room - and then we pop over there. You guys just stay here as if we're docking and awaiting the Mortal Queen's further instructions."</p><p></p><p>"Better get to whatever spellcasting you want to do," advised Dh'aeve. "I can see the rest of the fleet ahead. And don't bother trying <em>invisibility</em> or anything, as the helm room's covered in a <em>true seeing</em> effect - your drow disguises will be suppressed while you're in there."</p><p></p><p>Marlo and Cramer each cast a <em>magic circle against evil</em> spell upon themselves, always a good plan when going up against drow. Marlo cast a <em>Rary's telepathic bond</em> spell upon the five heroes. All but Utred received a <em>shield of faith</em> spell, the entire quintet received the benefits of a <em>mass bear's endurance</em> spell, and Cramer beefed himself up with spells of <em>spell resistance</em>, <em>longstrider</em>, <em>death ward</em>, and <em>righteous might</em>, the latter spell doubling the height of the three-and-a-half-foot tall gnome until he towered even over Jhasspok.</p><p></p><p>"A giant gnome," muttered Khari. "Now I've seen everything."</p><p></p><p>As Dh'aeve brought the ship floating to a halt above and to the side of the flagship, Cramer looked down, found the doors he'd be using as a focal point for his <em>teleport</em> spell, and cast the <em>silence</em> spell on Utred as planned. The dwarven barbarian stepped into the <em>bag of holding</em> Marlo held open for him, taking in a deep breath before she closed the bag shut. Then she nodded at the giant gnome cleric, Cramer cast his final spell, and the five were suddenly gone from the ship.</p><p></p><p><em>Teleporting</em> into the flagship's helm room, all was as Matron Falmakyorl had described it over the <em>Rary's telepathic bond</em> spell to her nephew: the Mortal Queen sat at the ship's helm towards the back of the room, her senses focused on the area all around the outside of her floating vessel. The Matron of the Second Noble House of Overreach stood behind her and to one side, ready to sit at the ship's helm should the Mortal Queen abandon her post. And to either side of the Mortal Queen stood her bodyguards: a female anti-paladin of Lolth, <strong>Fiovia Bel'vior</strong>, before her to her left and a duskblade, <strong>Aravian Bel'vior</strong>, before her to her right. The five heroes stood directly in front of the heavy wooden doors that led out to the flagship's upper deck surface, lined up in two rows with the hand-to-hand combatants in the front and the two spellcasters in the back.</p><p></p><p>As the drow (with the notable exception of Matron Falmakyorl) gasped in surprise and shock at the sudden appearance of the odd group, Khari took off in a charge at his nearest foe, Fiovia. Despite not being able to use the <em>earthglide</em> function of his magical warhammer, the weapon did just fine as a blunt instrument and the dwarven fighter sent the female drow reeling from the blow to the side of the head he gave her before she could raise any defenses.</p><p></p><p>At almost the same time, Marlo opened the <em>bag of holding</em> and silence suddenly engulfed the room. That, she knew, would prevent not only their enemies but also her and Cramer from casting any further spells for the duration of the fight, but they'd already cast all of the preparatory spells they wanted to have active and their drow enemies presumably had had no such warning that such preparations were necessary. Plus, the group had no idea of just what spells the Mortal Queen's bodyguards might be capable of or how dependent they might be on spellcasting in battle, whereas she and Cramer both had martial weapons they could use in a fight.</p><p></p><p>But silence wasn't the only thing spilling out from Marlo's <em>bag of holding</em>; with an unheard combat yell, Utred charged out of the bag and struck at the Mortal Queen with the <em>flaming hellsteel greataxe</em> he'd taken as a trophy from Dwarven Hell when they'd rescued the Mithral Mage. The fire from his weapon's axe-blade seemed to do little damage to the half-fiend drow, but the blade itself did plenty; Utred would have loved to hear the silent scream of pain and fury spilling from the Mortal Queen's lips at being struck down in her own imagined place of safety and power.</p><p></p><p>Jhasspok rushed at the duskblade, snapping at him with his sharp teeth as well as swinging his own battleaxe with all of his considerable strength. Seven-foot-tall Cramer followed a parallel path to Utred's, although his swing with his double-sized light mace missed the Mortal Queen's head, likely because he was unused to fighting from a position of this great height. But Llolnida was already slashing her demon-claws at Utred, who'd had the audacity to strike her divine form with a base weapon forged by devils! Her mouth opened and closed rapidly, no doubt spouting out a constant stream of Drow and Abyssal obscenities that were absorbed unvoiced by the <em>silence</em> effect.</p><p></p><p>Now over her initial surprise at this unexpected attack, Fiovia channeled forth the unholy power of her demon-goddess patroness and sent it flowing through her weapon, striking its blade against Khari's shoulder. The dwarf responded almost instantly with a rapid series of hammer-strikes of his own, dropping her down to one knee. Marlo finished her off with a snap of her <em>life-flame whip</em>, striking the drow anti-paladin in the face and causing her to fall over, well into unconsciousness.</p><p></p><p>Jhasspok continued with his unrelenting battleaxe strikes, cutting through the duskblade Aravian's armor and deep into his flesh with each strike. The drow's rapier barely scratched the lizardfolk's scales when he tried to give back as good as he had gotten. But then Utred found himself uncharacteristically impotent in battle; after his initial charge his blade seemed unable to make contact with the wily Mortal Queen, try as he might. Fortunately, Cramer was there to pick up the barbarian's unexpected slack; he got in a good couple of whacks with his mace, causing the Mortal Queen to reassess the oversized gnome as her currently most dangerous threat. She sliced at him with her demon-claws...and found herself in the same boat as Utred, missing by a large margin. Cramer just grinned down mockingly at her.</p><p></p><p>Deprived of his most recent foe, Khari charged at the Mortal Queen, striking her with his warhammer while she twisted at the helm to claw ineffectually at Cramer. Marlo's whip snapped over at the drow leader as well, but its tip struck only the air between the Mortal Queen's upraised horns. Jhasspok made quick work of the duskblade and turned to face the Mortal Queen as well. His battleaxe slashed out, slicing through the armor of the woman's right thigh. Blood pooled up at the wound.</p><p></p><p>Desperately, the Mortal Queen slashed out at the enemies surrounding her, making brief eye contact with Matron Falmakyorl, whose only contribution to the fight was to take a step to her right to get out of the way of Jhasspok's swinging tail as he spun to bring his battleaxe into an overhead swing down at Llolnida. Eventually, it was Khari's <em>earthglide warhammer</em> that made the killing blow and the Mortal Queen slumped off the side of the spelljamming helm. Only then did Matron Falmakyorl spring into action, kicking the body of her erstwhile leader to the side and leaping onto the helm, positioning herself in place to see to its stability before it could fall from the sky.</p><p></p><p>Marlo coiled her <em>life-flame whip</em> at her hip and drew her other weapon, the <em>arcane blade</em>. Cramer dismissed the <em>silence</em> effect as Marlo put her blade to good use.</p><p></p><p>"I think it's time to let the rest of them know," Cramer told Marlo, opening the double doors from the helm room.</p><p></p><p>Marlo strode regally through the open doors, pushing her way past a pair of female drow bodyguards supposedly preventing anyone from entering the helm room. They were astonished that some drow woman had made it past them - for now outside of the helm room and its <em>true seeing</em> effect, Marlo was once more covered in Archmage Xiandria's <em>veil</em> spell - but even more astonished by what she held in her hands.</p><p></p><p>Marlo didn't hold it for long, though. Tossing the decapitated head of Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior onto the deck, Marlo called out in a loud voice, "The so-called Mortal Queen is dead! Stand down and bow before your new queen: Matron Falmakyorl!"</p><p></p><p>Sudden new leadership wasn't anything to which the drow were unaccustomed; they acknowledged the reality of the new situation surprisingly fast. The five heroes boarded Dh'aeve's vessel and the five drow soldiers who had been on board - originally to have been an assault force - were sent to the flagship to be the voice of their new queen. In the meantime, Dh'aeve flew the heroes back to Greenvale, filling them in on some of the new queen's edicts as he piloted the ship to its destination. Apparently the members of House Bel'vior were to be reduced to slave status. And Matron Falmakyorl planned to continue the Mortal Queen's evacuation plan, only with herself as the queen of the new world they would eventually settle upon. There was still only room for 300 of the most loyal drow on the spelljamming vessels, but now "loyalty" had to be reassessed to mean those who had been loyal to House Falmakyorl, not to that half-breed abomination who had self-importantly elevated herself above all drow. And as far as having Lolth's support in all of this, the new queen's best argument was that the Demon-Queen of Spiders had allowed events to unfold as they had - and who would dare argue against that?</p><p></p><p>"Things will be tense in the Overreach for a while while the Houses fill the power vacuum left behind by the evacuated Houses," Dh'aeve surmised. "With House Bel'vior revoked and most of the House Falmakyorl leadership departing, that will likely leave House Jalamir as the strongest contender for First House." There was a good chance House Ky'hulcressen, currently the Eighth House and lowest of the Noble Houses, would be elevated in station and several of the smaller Houses would finally be able to jockey for Noble status.</p><p></p><p>That all worked fine for Cramer; with House Jalamir in charge, they'd be able to put more effort into uncovering the mysteries of the prophecies concerning the five heroes. They'd already come to the conclusion there might be a better way to prevent the end of the world rather than either of the three prophecies to which they'd already been introduced, for according to the book found in the Far Realm, of the 10 anchors (also known as Writhing Gates) that tethered the Dying One to the Material Plane, only seven were needed for him to come through. Since one gate was apparently already broken, if the group could figure out how to destroy three more gates, it wouldn't matter if a neothelid went through one of the gates and became the new Uboros, as it wouldn't be able to return to the Material Plane and therefore wouldn't be able to destroy the world.</p><p></p><p>"Good," Jhasspok agreed. "I don't want the world to be destroyed."</p><p></p><p>"And I'd just as soon not have to fight a giant worm if we don't have to," added Khari.</p><p></p><p>Unfortunately, the Greenvale scholars had no leads on where the other nine gates were located, as the illithid names for them in the book were meaningless to them. "It's like if they called Greenvale by a different name in their language, we'd know they were talking about a place by that specific name but we'd have no idea it was Greenvale they were referring to," explained one of the scholars.</p><p></p><p>"So how are going to track them down?" asked Cramer.</p><p></p><p>"Maybe we should ask a mind flayer," Jhasspok suggested.</p><p></p><p>"Jhasspok, with N'zorthal dead we don't have access to any mind flayers," Cramer chided the lizardfolk.</p><p></p><p>Jhasspok merely shrugged his scaly shoulders. "But wouldn't it be easier to find a mind flayer than to find the Writhing Gates?" he countered. "There's probably a lot more of them."</p><p></p><p>Cramer opened his mouth to argue, but then closed it as he thought. Rubbing his beard he mused, "Easier? Probably. But as for less dangerous, I don't think so. Still...."</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>Poor Joe's dice abandoned him after his initial attack on the Mortal Queen. And I felt bad for Logan, for he had intended us to have to fight our way past five drow bodyguards and an 11th-level evoker to even get into the helm room to fight the Mortal Queen and her niece and nephew. That was a lot of stat work that never got used. Likewise for any spell decisions he'd made for the anti-paladin and the duskblade, since our <em>silence</em> stratagem rendered any further spellcasting useless. But that's the way it goes sometimes, and any shortening of the adventure by cutting down the number of combat enemies we had to face was no doubt eaten up by Dan, as he took a solid 20 minutes to decide on which spells Cramer would prep for the session and then another 20 minutes or so deciding which ones to cast on us immediately before battle. (Of course, a lot of the latter was spent by Logan updating our armor classes and "floating" hit points and such on his PC tracking sheet.)</p><p></p><p>Not unexpectedly, we leveled up to 13th level at the end of this adventure, breaking a new record by only spending one adventure at 12th level. I don't think we've ever done that in any of our previous campaigns.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 8328011, member: 508"] [B]ADVENTURE 37: PUTTING THE "MORTAL" IN THE QUEEN[/B] PC Roster: [INDENT]Cramer Appleknocker, gnome cleric 12[/INDENT] [INDENT] Jhasspok, lizardman 3/barbarian 3/fighter 6[/INDENT] [INDENT] Khari Hammerslammer, dwarf fighter 12[/INDENT] [INDENT] Marlo Pendragon, human sorcerer 12[/INDENT] [INDENT] Utred "Buckets" Butterflinger, dwarf barbarian 12[/INDENT] Game Session Date: 30 June 2021 - - - "We're almost there," Dh'aeve told the others. [B]Dh'aeve Falmakyorl[/B] sat at the helm powering the spelljamming vessel and keeping it in flight. After the invasion of the surface world had ended up with some surprising reversals - not least of which was the sudden crashing of two of the flying ships filled with [I]contagion[/I]-laden slaves when their pilots apparently abandoned their helms in mid-flight - the Mortal Queen had made some immediate changes. First of all, each vessel now required a backup pilot standing by at all times to take over the helm should something happen to the primary pilot. These ships were expensive, not easily replaced, and were the only means by which the Mortal Queen, Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior, would lead 300 of her most loyal followers to a new world, abandoning this one to the Dying One - whose return to the Material Plane would likely lay waste to the entire planet. This edict applied to all drow spelljamming vessels, even the flagship, which the Mortal Queen entrusted none to pilot but herself. Standing beside her was [B]Matron Falmakyorl[/B], leader of the Second House of Overreach, Falmakyorl being the Noble House responsible for the Overreach Navy. Unknown to the Mortal Queen, Matron Falmakyorl was a drow purist who despised Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior's half-fiend nature, viewing her as unfit to be a House Matron let alone the self-professed Queen of the Drow. She was currently under a [I]Rary's telepathic bond[/I] spell linking her to her nephew, Dh'aeve, and filling him in on everything going on in the vicinity of the flagship's magical helm. As far as the Mortal Queen was aware, Matron Falmakyorl's presence there was merely as her backup pilot should she need to replace Llolnida at the spelljamming helm; she had no idea the House Matron was equally willing to relieve her of her duties as Queen of the Drow and step into that role as well. Dh'aeve was piloting his own ship to rendezvous with the flagship, for the Mortal Queen had summoned the entire remaining fleet to her, floating over the mountains to the northwest of hated Greenvale. The surface city of expatriate drow had survived the recent attack, in no small part due to the alliances made with their surface-world neighbors. Standing on the ship's open deck were the five former arena slaves of House Jalamir, now free citizens of Overreach's Third House and the ones responsible for many of those alliances. A small group of drow soldiers stood among them, although a [I]veil[/I] spell cast upon the five heroes by the Archmage Xiandria Jalamir gave them each the appearance of a drow as well. The original plan was for the smaller vessel to get within boarding distance of the flagship, at which time all ten passengers would leap aboard and the real drow soldiers would keep the Mortal Queen's drow allies at bay on board the flagship's main deck while the heroes fought their way into the back room of the vessel, giving them a chance to take out the Mortal Queen as she sat at the ship's helm. However, as Dh'aeve brought his ship into position, the heroes greatly altered the plan. Getting information directly from Matron Falmakyorl herself over the telepathic link, it seemed a much better approach was for Cramer to [I]teleport[/I] the group directly to the Mortal Queen's helm room - that way, there would be only the Mortal Queen and her two bodyguards, her own trusted niece and nephew, to contend with - Matron Falmakyorl would be there as well, of course, but she would not raise a finger in the protection of her alleged superior. Best of all, as the helm of the flagship was in an enclosed room in the back of the vessel, nobody would see the heroes' attack but those inside the room with them. "It'd be even better if you cast a [I]silence[/I] spell on me," suggested Utred. "That way, none of them would be able to cast any spells." "The Mortal Queen can't cast any spells in any case," pointed out Cramer. "Powering a spelljamming helm drains the pilot of the ability to cast spells for a full 24 hours." Dh'aeve acknowledged that this was true. "And anyway, if I cast a [I]silence[/I] spell on you, then I can't cast the [I]teleport[/I] spell and bring you along with, which defeats the whole purpose." "So cast it on me after we show up in the room with her," Utred argued. "We'll want to [I]teleport[/I] in and hit them hard and fast before they have much of a chance to react," Marlo countered. "However...." An idea had suddenly popped into her head. She unfolded the [I]bag of holding[/I] in which the group stored their communal property. "What if we cast the [I]silence[/I] spell on you and then you hopped into the bag? I could hold the opening shut long enough for us to [I]teleport[/I] over, then open it as soon as we got there and you could pop out. The silent effect would only affect the bag's interior while you were inside, so Cramer could still cast his spell to get us over there...." "I like it!" enthused the gnome. "But what about us?" asked the leader of the small band of drow soldiers who had planned on storming the deck of the flagship. "New plan," Cramer informed them. "Dh'aeve pilots us into position - anywhere I can get a good view of the doors to the flagship's helm room - and then we pop over there. You guys just stay here as if we're docking and awaiting the Mortal Queen's further instructions." "Better get to whatever spellcasting you want to do," advised Dh'aeve. "I can see the rest of the fleet ahead. And don't bother trying [I]invisibility[/I] or anything, as the helm room's covered in a [I]true seeing[/I] effect - your drow disguises will be suppressed while you're in there." Marlo and Cramer each cast a [I]magic circle against evil[/I] spell upon themselves, always a good plan when going up against drow. Marlo cast a [I]Rary's telepathic bond[/I] spell upon the five heroes. All but Utred received a [I]shield of faith[/I] spell, the entire quintet received the benefits of a [I]mass bear's endurance[/I] spell, and Cramer beefed himself up with spells of [I]spell resistance[/I], [I]longstrider[/I], [I]death ward[/I], and [I]righteous might[/I], the latter spell doubling the height of the three-and-a-half-foot tall gnome until he towered even over Jhasspok. "A giant gnome," muttered Khari. "Now I've seen everything." As Dh'aeve brought the ship floating to a halt above and to the side of the flagship, Cramer looked down, found the doors he'd be using as a focal point for his [I]teleport[/I] spell, and cast the [I]silence[/I] spell on Utred as planned. The dwarven barbarian stepped into the [I]bag of holding[/I] Marlo held open for him, taking in a deep breath before she closed the bag shut. Then she nodded at the giant gnome cleric, Cramer cast his final spell, and the five were suddenly gone from the ship. [I]Teleporting[/I] into the flagship's helm room, all was as Matron Falmakyorl had described it over the [I]Rary's telepathic bond[/I] spell to her nephew: the Mortal Queen sat at the ship's helm towards the back of the room, her senses focused on the area all around the outside of her floating vessel. The Matron of the Second Noble House of Overreach stood behind her and to one side, ready to sit at the ship's helm should the Mortal Queen abandon her post. And to either side of the Mortal Queen stood her bodyguards: a female anti-paladin of Lolth, [B]Fiovia Bel'vior[/B], before her to her left and a duskblade, [B]Aravian Bel'vior[/B], before her to her right. The five heroes stood directly in front of the heavy wooden doors that led out to the flagship's upper deck surface, lined up in two rows with the hand-to-hand combatants in the front and the two spellcasters in the back. As the drow (with the notable exception of Matron Falmakyorl) gasped in surprise and shock at the sudden appearance of the odd group, Khari took off in a charge at his nearest foe, Fiovia. Despite not being able to use the [I]earthglide[/I] function of his magical warhammer, the weapon did just fine as a blunt instrument and the dwarven fighter sent the female drow reeling from the blow to the side of the head he gave her before she could raise any defenses. At almost the same time, Marlo opened the [I]bag of holding[/I] and silence suddenly engulfed the room. That, she knew, would prevent not only their enemies but also her and Cramer from casting any further spells for the duration of the fight, but they'd already cast all of the preparatory spells they wanted to have active and their drow enemies presumably had had no such warning that such preparations were necessary. Plus, the group had no idea of just what spells the Mortal Queen's bodyguards might be capable of or how dependent they might be on spellcasting in battle, whereas she and Cramer both had martial weapons they could use in a fight. But silence wasn't the only thing spilling out from Marlo's [I]bag of holding[/I]; with an unheard combat yell, Utred charged out of the bag and struck at the Mortal Queen with the [I]flaming hellsteel greataxe[/I] he'd taken as a trophy from Dwarven Hell when they'd rescued the Mithral Mage. The fire from his weapon's axe-blade seemed to do little damage to the half-fiend drow, but the blade itself did plenty; Utred would have loved to hear the silent scream of pain and fury spilling from the Mortal Queen's lips at being struck down in her own imagined place of safety and power. Jhasspok rushed at the duskblade, snapping at him with his sharp teeth as well as swinging his own battleaxe with all of his considerable strength. Seven-foot-tall Cramer followed a parallel path to Utred's, although his swing with his double-sized light mace missed the Mortal Queen's head, likely because he was unused to fighting from a position of this great height. But Llolnida was already slashing her demon-claws at Utred, who'd had the audacity to strike her divine form with a base weapon forged by devils! Her mouth opened and closed rapidly, no doubt spouting out a constant stream of Drow and Abyssal obscenities that were absorbed unvoiced by the [I]silence[/I] effect. Now over her initial surprise at this unexpected attack, Fiovia channeled forth the unholy power of her demon-goddess patroness and sent it flowing through her weapon, striking its blade against Khari's shoulder. The dwarf responded almost instantly with a rapid series of hammer-strikes of his own, dropping her down to one knee. Marlo finished her off with a snap of her [I]life-flame whip[/I], striking the drow anti-paladin in the face and causing her to fall over, well into unconsciousness. Jhasspok continued with his unrelenting battleaxe strikes, cutting through the duskblade Aravian's armor and deep into his flesh with each strike. The drow's rapier barely scratched the lizardfolk's scales when he tried to give back as good as he had gotten. But then Utred found himself uncharacteristically impotent in battle; after his initial charge his blade seemed unable to make contact with the wily Mortal Queen, try as he might. Fortunately, Cramer was there to pick up the barbarian's unexpected slack; he got in a good couple of whacks with his mace, causing the Mortal Queen to reassess the oversized gnome as her currently most dangerous threat. She sliced at him with her demon-claws...and found herself in the same boat as Utred, missing by a large margin. Cramer just grinned down mockingly at her. Deprived of his most recent foe, Khari charged at the Mortal Queen, striking her with his warhammer while she twisted at the helm to claw ineffectually at Cramer. Marlo's whip snapped over at the drow leader as well, but its tip struck only the air between the Mortal Queen's upraised horns. Jhasspok made quick work of the duskblade and turned to face the Mortal Queen as well. His battleaxe slashed out, slicing through the armor of the woman's right thigh. Blood pooled up at the wound. Desperately, the Mortal Queen slashed out at the enemies surrounding her, making brief eye contact with Matron Falmakyorl, whose only contribution to the fight was to take a step to her right to get out of the way of Jhasspok's swinging tail as he spun to bring his battleaxe into an overhead swing down at Llolnida. Eventually, it was Khari's [I]earthglide warhammer[/I] that made the killing blow and the Mortal Queen slumped off the side of the spelljamming helm. Only then did Matron Falmakyorl spring into action, kicking the body of her erstwhile leader to the side and leaping onto the helm, positioning herself in place to see to its stability before it could fall from the sky. Marlo coiled her [I]life-flame whip[/I] at her hip and drew her other weapon, the [I]arcane blade[/I]. Cramer dismissed the [I]silence[/I] effect as Marlo put her blade to good use. "I think it's time to let the rest of them know," Cramer told Marlo, opening the double doors from the helm room. Marlo strode regally through the open doors, pushing her way past a pair of female drow bodyguards supposedly preventing anyone from entering the helm room. They were astonished that some drow woman had made it past them - for now outside of the helm room and its [I]true seeing[/I] effect, Marlo was once more covered in Archmage Xiandria's [I]veil[/I] spell - but even more astonished by what she held in her hands. Marlo didn't hold it for long, though. Tossing the decapitated head of Llolnida Alyxyra Bel'vior onto the deck, Marlo called out in a loud voice, "The so-called Mortal Queen is dead! Stand down and bow before your new queen: Matron Falmakyorl!" Sudden new leadership wasn't anything to which the drow were unaccustomed; they acknowledged the reality of the new situation surprisingly fast. The five heroes boarded Dh'aeve's vessel and the five drow soldiers who had been on board - originally to have been an assault force - were sent to the flagship to be the voice of their new queen. In the meantime, Dh'aeve flew the heroes back to Greenvale, filling them in on some of the new queen's edicts as he piloted the ship to its destination. Apparently the members of House Bel'vior were to be reduced to slave status. And Matron Falmakyorl planned to continue the Mortal Queen's evacuation plan, only with herself as the queen of the new world they would eventually settle upon. There was still only room for 300 of the most loyal drow on the spelljamming vessels, but now "loyalty" had to be reassessed to mean those who had been loyal to House Falmakyorl, not to that half-breed abomination who had self-importantly elevated herself above all drow. And as far as having Lolth's support in all of this, the new queen's best argument was that the Demon-Queen of Spiders had allowed events to unfold as they had - and who would dare argue against that? "Things will be tense in the Overreach for a while while the Houses fill the power vacuum left behind by the evacuated Houses," Dh'aeve surmised. "With House Bel'vior revoked and most of the House Falmakyorl leadership departing, that will likely leave House Jalamir as the strongest contender for First House." There was a good chance House Ky'hulcressen, currently the Eighth House and lowest of the Noble Houses, would be elevated in station and several of the smaller Houses would finally be able to jockey for Noble status. That all worked fine for Cramer; with House Jalamir in charge, they'd be able to put more effort into uncovering the mysteries of the prophecies concerning the five heroes. They'd already come to the conclusion there might be a better way to prevent the end of the world rather than either of the three prophecies to which they'd already been introduced, for according to the book found in the Far Realm, of the 10 anchors (also known as Writhing Gates) that tethered the Dying One to the Material Plane, only seven were needed for him to come through. Since one gate was apparently already broken, if the group could figure out how to destroy three more gates, it wouldn't matter if a neothelid went through one of the gates and became the new Uboros, as it wouldn't be able to return to the Material Plane and therefore wouldn't be able to destroy the world. "Good," Jhasspok agreed. "I don't want the world to be destroyed." "And I'd just as soon not have to fight a giant worm if we don't have to," added Khari. Unfortunately, the Greenvale scholars had no leads on where the other nine gates were located, as the illithid names for them in the book were meaningless to them. "It's like if they called Greenvale by a different name in their language, we'd know they were talking about a place by that specific name but we'd have no idea it was Greenvale they were referring to," explained one of the scholars. "So how are going to track them down?" asked Cramer. "Maybe we should ask a mind flayer," Jhasspok suggested. "Jhasspok, with N'zorthal dead we don't have access to any mind flayers," Cramer chided the lizardfolk. Jhasspok merely shrugged his scaly shoulders. "But wouldn't it be easier to find a mind flayer than to find the Writhing Gates?" he countered. "There's probably a lot more of them." Cramer opened his mouth to argue, but then closed it as he thought. Rubbing his beard he mused, "Easier? Probably. But as for less dangerous, I don't think so. Still...." - - - Poor Joe's dice abandoned him after his initial attack on the Mortal Queen. And I felt bad for Logan, for he had intended us to have to fight our way past five drow bodyguards and an 11th-level evoker to even get into the helm room to fight the Mortal Queen and her niece and nephew. That was a lot of stat work that never got used. Likewise for any spell decisions he'd made for the anti-paladin and the duskblade, since our [I]silence[/I] stratagem rendered any further spellcasting useless. But that's the way it goes sometimes, and any shortening of the adventure by cutting down the number of combat enemies we had to face was no doubt eaten up by Dan, as he took a solid 20 minutes to decide on which spells Cramer would prep for the session and then another 20 minutes or so deciding which ones to cast on us immediately before battle. (Of course, a lot of the latter was spent by Logan updating our armor classes and "floating" hit points and such on his PC tracking sheet.) Not unexpectedly, we leveled up to 13th level at the end of this adventure, breaking a new record by only spending one adventure at 12th level. I don't think we've ever done that in any of our previous campaigns. [/QUOTE]
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