Wednesday 4 November 2015

Khan’s Report: Dark Pyramid of Sorcerer’s Isle


Tyranny of Dragons Storyline Season – Expedition 11: Dark Pyramid of Sorcerer’s Isle
[Heart of Platinum]
Khan (dwarf cleric), Lanza (elf bard), Sasha (human ranger), Septimus (tiefling warlock)

Previously: The City of Phlan has fallen captive to the Cult of the Dragon, led by the elder green dragon known as The Maimed Virulence. The heroes were forced to flee the city, and await the right time to take it back. But a pressing situation is laid before them, when the dark powers of a long forgotten pyramid threaten the landscape around Phlan…


Sooooooo, this is going to be the LEAST EPIC adventure log... ever!
The party was invited by "generic important NPCs" to investigate the origins of an act of corruption/defiling towards Nature. An ancient pyramid had been spilling a foul liquid into the river that serves the city of Phlan (DAMN YOU, MR. BURNS!!!), causing the fish, other animals, and plants to mutate into hideous things. Even more hideous than Septimus, our fellow tiefling...

Death by Sardines
The group travelled through the forest, encountering several abhorrent fauna and flora. Eventually, a raft was used to take the heroes to the pyramid’s island. That’s where our epicness began. The raft was attacked by tentacles, causing the warlock to fall overboard, whom was in turn attacked by a shoal of mutant sardines, going below zero hit points. The bard bended towards the water to catch the unconscious tiefling… and was also attacked by the sardines! Also becoming knocked-out! So, we have an unconscious tiefling floating in the water, with a bard grabbing his legs, who in turn is ALSO unconscious, with the ranger ALSO holding his legs, while half the party is getting its ass kicked… by sardines!
Yes, we are supposed to be the epic heroes of Phlan, saving the world from the Cult of the Dragon.

Death by Ale Mugs
We enter the pyramid, where several tests are presented to us (which I will not reveal, in order to avoid spoilers), and pass through several encounters and traps, finding out that the pyramid’s corridors and rooms are shifting and have some interdimensional weirdness occurring.
Perhaps now would be a good time to say that I ABSOLUTELY HATE DUNGEON CRAWLING! I mean, I hate it more than I hate elves! If it were up to me, this game would be called Dragons & Dragons.


At a given point in time & space we arrive at a room where a new totally epic scene awaits us. The room if full of… kitchen utensils. Ale mugs, an iron pot, a scale, and a couple of old armors. Praise Bahamut that they were animated armors, and not animated aprons! At least what followed can be a little less humiliating… Well, actually it can’t!
We were attacked by the aforementioned kitchen tools. I am supposed to be a heroic level five cleric of Bahamut, yet I find myself exchanging blows with two animated ale mugs, while my fellow comrades have their asses whooped by the same iron pot where Samwise Gamgee cooked rabbits for Frodo, and a pair of scales. Allow me to be 100% clear: when I say “scales” I’m not mentioning some sort of magical enhanced dragon scales. I’m mentioning the stuff you use to weigh PO-TA-TOES! Yes, the same potatoes that Sam wanted to cook the rabbits with.
The only good thing coming out of this encounter was having the imp killed by the cooking pot. It is impossible to have a more idiotic death in D&D. One can almost think about its tombstone: “Here lies Generic Evil Imp. Killed by a cooking pot. He will not be missed”

Death by George R R Martin
So, our D&D group (with D&D standing for Dumb & Dumber) continued its epic walk along the pyramid, until an encounter with a Red Wizard and his friends occurred. We managed to enter the room by surprise, and assaulted the fighter that was near the door. Then, out of nowhere, behind door number five, a wild Generic Red Wizard of Thay appears. Aaaaand, Ice Storm, Fireball, you’re all dead by A Song of Ice and Fire.
It ended up not being a TPK because… well, because the DM didn’t want to wait for us to roll new characters!
Thus, we were released by the ranger (who had missed the session), went after the Generic Red Wizard of Thay… and allowed him to flee the pyramid. Yes, that’s it. We suck so much that we couldn’t even kill the bad guy. When the DM asked us “But, aren’t you going to look for the Cult of the Dragon members that entered the pyramid?” we answered with a collective “Screw this shit, we’re going home!”

Death by Imp
The last (?) room of the pyramid (where we confronted the Generic Red Wizard of Thay), had a set of alien machinery operated by enthralled lizardmen, connected via pipes to an extradimensional breach from where the generic evil black goo was being fueled. With a lot of precision, expertise, and knowledge about engineering, we smashed everything to smithereens.
Was it over? Noooooo, because, meanwhile, the bloody imp had returned to life. The machines’ room was guarded by red slaad (evil frogs of Hell), which had several eggs (note: I wish autocorrect would stop correcting “slaad” to “salad”, because it would be awkward to have a room guarded by “red salad”… Well, in due honesty, in this quest in particular I guess it wouldn’t be that awkward.). My dwarf noticed Septimus, the tiefling warlock, attempting to steal one of the eggs. When I insisted that he returned it to be smashed-by-the-boot-of-the-dwarf, the bitchy imp attacked me from behind. After the final fight I was at 9 hp. I went to the floor…

Aftermath
If the mood between Khan and Septimus wasn’t good until now, one can imagine how it will be in the future… One thing is to have a good-aligned cleric trying to ignore a pestering, yet majorly harmless, imp. Another is to have that imp betray the party and attack one of its members when he is vulnerable.
One thing’s for sure: something will change, for worse, amid the party. But that is what you get when you mix a holy servitor of Bahamut, god of good dragons, and a servitor of Mephistopheles, archdevil of the nine hells…

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