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JoeSchmoe
Memunite
(9/28/03 10:40 pm)
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funny story about the aboleth side adventure (kinda long)
I downloaded the WoTC side adventure to use in the campaign and the group went through it a few weeks ago but after clearing everything but the caverns then a quick pimp slapping from one of the aboleths they turned around and headed for the surface. Today one of the players couldn't make it but dropped off his PC sheets.
The group was supposed to go to Verbobonc to sell their stuff and get a couple of better weapons but we couldn't find the inventory listing which the missing player had apparently forgotten to give us, so I suggested finishing off the side adventure.
The group:
12th lvl fighter
10/1 wiz/cleric (played by the fighter)
11th lvl cleric
11th lvl theif
12th lvl druid (the missing player, played by the thief)
After the Master aboleth projects an image of a caved-in corridor, the group doesn't even investigate it and goes to the stairs (area 1 . They get water breathing and wings of the sea cast on most of the group. The druid changes to an octopus and the fighter, thief and wiz hold on while he pulls them along. The cleric swims along by himself holding the continual flame torch. They make their way through the spiked gauntlet and take a left to the big cave. The cleric hangs back with the light and the druid takes the rest through the murky water (I made it real silty but they still forge ahead after some debate underwater).
As soon as they are in the big pool, the Master casts darkness on them and tries to poison the druid/octopus. He's an elf so that didn't work. The wizard casts dispel magic 30' ahead of their position, after I remind them they have water breathing and swimming aids cast on them. He figures that they will be moving forward, so they'll come into the light soon. The thief blindly fires into the darkness with a crossbow, hitting nothing. The Master smacks up the octopus for tons of damage.
Next round, the fighter lets go of the octopus and tries to swim forward. Unfortunately, the thief and wizard were holding onto the fighter so they are left floating as well. The thief fires again (repeating crossbow). The wizard can't do much but thought about cast lightning bolt (I pointed out that while there was nothing against casting it in water, it is described as a "bolt of energy" or something like that and I'd played Quake 2 enough times to figure that lightning bolt + water = bad news!). The Master smacks up the octopus again for a total of about 50 hp by now. The fighter moves up and tries to swing, and actually hits a couple of times. The druid/octopus jets away, where the cleric sees him emerge from the darkness and moves to heal him.
The fighter takes over 100 hp damage from the Master over the next couple of rounds, actually dropping him to -2. Meanwhile, the druid had moved up and managed to grab the 3 people he'd left behind, and jets back to the relative safety of the gauntlet. The Master doesn't follow them, I figured he'd just want to be left alone. He'd take over 50 hp damage by now so he'd want to strategize a bit and figure out who these folks are.
So what does the group do. Do they go back to their gear at the steps near area 18? Nope, they head to the bone-littered killing room, where they lick their wounds. Pretty soon, they hear a splash from the south shore but when they go to investigate they find just water splashes and footprints.
The druid and fighter had been hit by the Master several times and had failed multiple saves against the "jelly skin" disease, so they had to chill in the water. The wizard was looking over them while two of the smaller aboleths moved up and started dominating them. The fighter made his first save, but the druid and wizard zoned out. Since they made their saves against going deeper into the water and attacking their group members, the aboleths just told them to sit there and do nothing. The fighter had no idea what was going on.
The fighter dragged the other two out of the water and over to the other shore where the water drops off quicker (and the aboleths can move closer to) and eventually dominated the fighter. Meanwhile the surviving skum and the kua-toan thief try to attack but the thief scares them away with his repeating crossbow, killing the skum. Soon, the thief found the druid face down in the water and the fighter at the bottom and used a grappling hook to pull him up. The fighter had water breathing on him so he was okay. Then the thief fails his will save against domination so he's catatonic with the druid and fighter at his feet.
The cleric walks up and sees this, actually makes his will save, and pulls everybody back against the back wall where they are "safe". He's able to get water using the fighter's boots and later on the thief's bag of holding - this keeps the druid and fighter safe by keeping their skin moist for the time being. He also summons a water elemental to fight the aboleths (he only knew of two that were there, but there were three), and manages to take all of them to nearly 70 hp losses before the elemental is destroyed.
The thief tries a couple of sneak attacks but misses with the half-spear and has to do a frontal assault - the cleric tries using the fighter's cherished sword and the druid's cherished scimitar but loses them both to the sticky shield (great comic value in that!). The kua-toan runs away hurt badly, but the aboleths soon use their hypnotic pattern to mesmerize him while the kua-toan thief comes up and steals all the items they brought with them, knocks out the cleric and stabs him for good measure. Then he misses a will save and gets dominated. So the entire party is dominated.
A full day later (because of the dominate power) the wizard comes to and sees the two "senior" party members dessicated like dried-up jellyfish on a lonely beach, and the rest of the party just laying there. The aboleths have been chanting to promote the greatness of Tharizdun, and soon start with the hypnotic patterns and images of ochre-robed clerics floating above the water, seemingly chanting at him. To really up the creepy factor the aboleths make the two surviving dominated members stand up and screech at the wizard with fingers pointed at him, a la the end of the original Body Snatchers movie. Later, they walk circles around him until they are physically too exhausted and fall down. The player for this character really did well getting into the moment, kinda going crazy with me as the effects of these psionics and other things are going off around him.
Just before the wizard is about to go fully insane the cleric comes to and prays mightily to his god so he can request his magic powers earlier than he normally does (he'd been out of it for two days or so). Corellon takes pity and lets the cleric get his spells and they soon have an air elemental whisking away one of the dead party members, and etherealness is used to get the rest out. The thief still hadn't come to, and when we ended the session there were no experience points for anyone after 6 or 7 hours of what turned out to be a really fun and funny session!
I didn't play it to the hilt (the Master could have flown out of the water, I could have used the psionics more, etc.) because I didn't want to have to deal with a TPK but just to the point of fun. And I thought it wouldn't be a great night! hehe
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madfox
Cherub
(9/29/03 4:07 am)
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Re: funny story about the aboleth side adventure (kinda long
A great example of why a cleric should always have a protection from evil ready, especially when facing aboleths 
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JoeSchmoe
Memunite
(9/29/03 6:06 pm)
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Re: funny story about the aboleth side adventure (kinda long
So far they don't know what an aboleth is, so they basically ran in prepped with some water spells.
Possibly the best part was when the guy who plays the druid called after we finished and ask "so did you kill me off?" and I got to tell him well, yeah! haha They'll be okay as a group, but now the two highest-level PCs are the same level as the others (unless they do something other than raise dead).
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