Grey Area

September 17, 2015

The group is exhausted after the fight at Carowyn Manor and goes back to rest.  They know they need to go to the Gray area and try and find the mausoleum that Jolistina described, or that Cress saw in her thoughts.  After a night's rest, they check in with their crew and then go to the Gray district.  

One of the acolytes of Pharasma recognizes Lazarus, who eats it up, and gladly tells them what he knows.  It would seem that there has been extra activity near a particular mausoleum and he guides them to it.  Cress recognizes it as one he saw, so they thank the acolyte and ready themselves to go inside.  They discuss what they are going to do so much, though, that the first group hears them and confronts them.  They are asked to leave but don't comply.  

A fight breaks out.  Cress gets hit hard several times and complains afterward that the fighters didn't do their job.  Further, one of the enemy got away and that's going to be a problem.  That's when the derro show up.  The first group of mercenaries didn't know who was in charge but this groups says their leader, Vreeg, has claimed it and they should leave.  When it is confirmed that Vreeg is a necromancer, the group fights.  

They are confronted by another group, including a half orc named Giggles, who tries to recruit them.  As he appears to be listening, Grohlyn charges forward and a fight happens.  Here's where things got weird.  Lazarus, in playing one of his songs on the derro, somehow managed to animate him and bring him along.  Lazarus sends him into the fray and the derro does so with glee.  When the derro takes down Giggles, Cress sees the derro eat Giggles' soul, which freaks him out.  Before Cress can say anything more than, "don't use the violin," Cabbagehead, an ogrekin, and Vreeg appear in the fight.  It's a tough fight, not helped by Lazarus asking the violin for help and it draining some of the other party members!  While they win, Cress and Trinia are upset.  

Cress tells Lazarus that he has to get rid of the violin and tries to smash it, to no avail.  Even trying to put it into an extradimensional space doesn't work as it finds its way back to Lazarus.  Lazarus, for his part, is blowing off Cress' concerns, saying that no one else has seen anything like what Cress said and that the animated derro helped them in the fight.  Niko, though, is unhappy to be drained again and recognized what happened from the early performance.  Cress gets into Lazarus' face, wielding a dagger but backs off and instead casts a spell at Lazarus!  

At this point in the confrontation, Lazarus experiences a time stop where the magic ray Cress cast is frozen and the draconic spirit from the violin asks Lazarus to help the spirit.  When Lazarus asks how he can help, the spirit tells Lazarus to perform sacrifices to him.  With each sacrifice, the spirit will get more power and he will share it with Lazarus.  While still pondering this, Lazarus says that he will be hit by the ray.  Time returns to normal and the ray hits Lazarus, blinding him.  

Cress says he's out of there.  Trinia also leaves.  Niko also starts walking away, not wanting to support Lazarus in this.  Grohlyn and Sveinn are left, wondering what Lazarus will decide.  

GM Notes

• Unfortunately, d20Pro messed up and was showing lock pictures instead of the pictures of creatures.  I did work with tech support, who were great, but in the end, I had to recreate a few icons with pictures that would work.  
• Having said that, I did get fog of war to work and found it to be easier than I thought.  It just took some playing with to figure it out.  
• I also found out how to add areas, cones, and other effects onto the battle, which worked well.
• The party also liked me using the hit point tracker of monsters, so they could see those on the monster's icon.  It worked out well.  
• The interesting thing to me was how much this was a return to years ago, when battles take a bit longer.  We had gotten to a point in the group where we could get through three fights and still do a fair amount of role playing.  We were slowed down, a combination of figuring out d20Pro and using it a bit more than normal.  I think the group is metagaming a bit, in terms of worrying about traps or other things.  Once we got into a groove, though, it went faster.  
• For being a necromancer, Vreeg was not nearly as capable as I wanted him to be.  However, he failed at least two spell checks to cast and lost them, so that didn't help.  Basically, a necromancer's ability is to create undead and have those around and that's not what Vreeg had.  Again, I should have thought of that and had him show up with a dozen zombies and a ghoul or two.  
• The confrontation between the players was epic!  Really well done, on a character level with no hard feelings, and it went well.  We did leave it with Dan, playing Lazarus, having to decide if he will accept the draconic spirit's offer, and become an NPC, or if he will reject the spirit.  Dan, as a new player, wanted time to think about it and I can understand that.  
• So far, leveling them up at certain points has been working out well!  I think it lets them focus on role playing a bit more, rather than worrying about xp to level up, but I could be wrong on that.   

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