GM: Dennis Jordan
Players: Regina Joyner, Karen Twelves, Eric Fattig, Mia Blankensop, and Sean Nittner
System: Pathfinder
Adventure Path: Kingmaker
We hella re-killed the crap out of that lich! This was the first (and so far only) dungeon delve in Kingmaker, and really the first time we were seriously taxed on resources. Having those discussions like “do we have enough time to rest or do we need to forge ahead even thought we’re out of spells and special abilities?” Kind of a Torchbearer moment. I love it.
Dudeface was bad news
One of his minions had captured Xanthia (the daughter of the Centair Chieftess) and he had been torturing her, you know for funzies.
He had a awful demon. The kind that talks in your head and constantly demeans you and insults you and talks about things that make you sad. And then tearing you to shreds with his crab claws. Bad demon.
He had a freaking dinosaur in a lake. Okay, that probably wasn’t because he was a bad guy, but still… Dinosaur!
He had a trap that, if we weren’t clever enough to detect would have dropped a lake on us!
He had not one, but TWO soul eaters just waiting for us to take a nap so they could get their soul chomping on.
Varn’s wizard was turned into a dread zombie. Dread zombie wizard, with fly and invisibility. And Fireball. And he was above a lake of lava. Ass!
Varn’s Ranger Gundarson was killed and then raised as a specter. Yeah, of the level draining variety.
And get this. Some trap with a riddle that needs all kinds of blood offered. It was kind of a lose-lose situation.
His feasting hall was filled arranged around a table with their heads opened up like cereal bowls. (the cereal is the brains). His basement was full of soul jars. 40 or so people preserved in little vessels and mentally tormented on his whim.
Vordakai himself is no chump. Or rather he’s a major chump. A needs magical bludgeoning weapons to hurt him, dimension dooring, dominate othering, negative energy channeling, rotting away lich chump!
Daughters of Aldori are pretty bad news themselves
Xanthia – Freed her. Gave her some weapons (Elara’s Keep Spear), makeshift armor (Armor spell from Oliveta), healed all her wounds (there were lots) and told her our solemn purpose to kick Vordakai’s ass. +1 Party member!
Insult Demon – Tricked him the first time into believing we were Big V’s servants. On the way out, he couldn’t be fooled (we had, after all just freed Xanthia) so we just smashed in him the carapace and kept smashing till it was dinner time. Wait, scratch that, we would never eat demon crab. Plus, he popped back Abyssal plane of Rush Limbaugh for more schooling on flinging insults.
Honey Badger don’t care about underwater dinosaurs. Honey badger doesn’t give a shit. It just stabs them and shoots them and dives into the water to ride on them. Honey badger, er the daughters of Aldoria don’t care.
Traps, shmaps – We figured out (thanks to a 32 Disable Device roll, woot!) how the whole late above was going to come flooding down on us if we didn’t disable the lever… so disable it we did. Sorry lake and lake inhabitants, no water slide rides for you.
He’s a soul man. Wait, he’s a soul eater. Wait, there are two of them. Rude enough to interrupt our rest and trying to get to our already damaged souls. Snicker snack, a few potions and scrolls of lesser restoration and we’re ready for more!
Cephal Lorentus, I think his name was. Sing it with me (to the tune of Rocky Racoon)
Cephal Lorentus checked into Varnhold
Only to find Vodekai’s summons.
Cephal had come equipped with a wand
To blast off the legs of a lich cyclops.
This lich it seems had broken his dreams
By turning him into a dread zombie
His name was Cephal and he called himself Ill
But we all knew him as flamecrombie
Now he and his spells which hurt just like hells
Were in the next room all invisible
Ladies burst in and grinning a grin
He dropped on our heads a fireball
But the Aldori were hot, they drew fast and shot
And Cephal collapsed in the lava, ahD’da d’da d’da da da da
D’da d’da d’da da da da
D’da d’da d’da da d’da d’da d’da d’da
Do do do do do do
Gundarson – Man, he almost got what he deserved. I mean, people say Merrowyn is reckless. Nobody is dumb like Gundardumb! But fighting till the bitter in and then being turned into an undead abomination, that’s just rough. So we made things a little better for him and sent his restless soul onto whatever elysian fields it was destined for. Read: we got stabby here too!
Fire Trap goes boom. We go heal. We’ve got more heals than fire trap has boom. Not a smart way to get through an obstacle but it worked.
The feasting hall was gross. The soul jars go for like 5K a piece. We burned those bodies and broke those jars. Not even a little tempted to keep them. Okay, a little tempted.
Vordakai. Man, this dude was a rock. Like, literally, his skin was rock hard. It’s rough when you find out someone has major damage reduction that requires magical bludgeoning weapons to overcome. Even rougher when you a bunch of SWORDLRDS! But we had one of those shrill piercing cries of “Lady Miquela!” and Tad arrived on hand with his +1 magic club. Nothing too fancy but it got the job done! That plus Merrowny just hits hard. Vital Strike, Enlarge Person, Lead Blades, and a lot of muscle make for a pounding, even with DR!
He kept using save or die spells on us (Dominate person and the like), between Oliveta’s Fortune hex, Hero Points and some god damn lucky rolls, we made it out without a TPK!
After the dust settled
We killed a freaking Lich. A weakened and withered, phylactary long since broken, forgot half his wizard levels, and way disoriented lich, but a lich just the same.
We found out after destroying the heck out of him that his eye wasn’t an eye at all but a an evil artifact.. the Oculus of Abaddon. What? This dude was messed up. Some seriously evil stuff there…but you know, if I just plucked out my eye, and put that in in it, the thing offers some pretty awesome powers. I mean… it’s just one eye.
But that eye… you know he one that would be really fashionable, it was also the spiritual center of the Centaur’s solemn duty. They were to watch over the cyclops graveyard, but really they were to make sure he Oculus stayed untouched and unused. Now that we captured it, the last of the Knights sworn to protect it, Xanthia, and really all of her people, had no purpose left but to destroy it. And hey, besides kind of wanting to insert it, that was our goal too! Allies!
Loot, we got a lot!
| Description | Qty | Value | Cash Value | Kept by |
| Large Masterwork Battleaxes | 6 | 1280 | 640 | |
| Silver Raven Figuring of Wondrous Power | 3800 | Merrowyn | ||
| Ring of Freedom of Movement | 40000 | Elara | ||
| Spellbook (spells to follow) | ||||
| Dagger +2 | 8002 | 4001 | ||
| Ring of Protection +3 | 18000 | Merrowyn | ||
| 1140 Platinum | 11400 | |||
| 13,000 Gold | 13000 | |||
| 103,000 Silver | 10300 | |||
| Art objects | 19500 | |||
| Diamonds | 2 | 10000 | Toti | |
| Ring of Friend Shiled | 50000 | Divy | ||
| Phylactery | 3500 | 1750 | ||
| Cloak of Reistance +2 | 8000 | Miquela | ||
| Ring of Protection +2 | 8000 | Elara | ||
| Ring of Protection +2 | 8000 | Oliveta | ||
| Cloak of Reistance +3 | 18000 | Oliveta | ||
| Tablets of Cyclops History | 10000 | |||
| Headband of Mental Prowess (+2 Int (Know: Planes), +2 Cha) | 10000 | 5000 | ||
| Dust of Dryness | 3 | 2550 | 1275 | |
| Gauntlets of Swiming and Climbing | 6250 | Divy | ||
| 6,750 Gold | 6750 | |||
| Greatsword +3 | 18350 | Merrowyn |
Thoughts on the game
This is the first real “dungeon crawl” we’ve seen in Kingmaker. I’m glad it was well thought out. Interesting monsters and fun landscapes for battles (underwater, over a lava pit, etc) and some unique and clever traps.
We played a long ass session to finish it out, but it felt super satisfying to have completed some thing big. It was the most straightforward of the adventure paths, but it all funneled down into one path. Discovering Varnhold, meeting with the centaurs and finally putting down Vordakai.
It was great getting to play with everyone at the table. Also, put us all together in one battle and we’ve got some serious firepower!
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