Game begins with Dian out for the night and Iglar not here yet… but no one wants to wait for him, sucker!

DM: Last time your party defeated the dread gauth, and friends. But at what cost? Dian’s parlayzed… Max is exhausted… I think someone else is exhausted. Iglar is exhausted. As the battle leaves, and the rage leaves you, they both collapse to the ground, seeking nothing more than to stop moving.

Exhaustion takes an hour of rest to clear, and fatigued (the next step up) takes a full eight hours of rest. Max snores violently.

DM: For once it’s appropriate for him to do that. Once… and only once.

Lacking any other place to set up, Sargassas attempts to haul the pair to the top of the pillar where the gauth had lurked… but the ledge that leads there is too small! Instead they set up under the bridge.

DM: All right, you find Anthony Kiedas.
Khoriane: (snickering)

A long pause.

Max: (snores)
Sargassas: I‘m… not sure about that joke.
DM: “Under the Bridge”, dude.
Sargassas: Oh. Right.

Sargassas laboriously mops up the incurred damage, The group starts dividing up the watch.

Ralth: There’s going to be worgs in here, aren’t there. I’m gonna take watch and there’ll be fucking worgs.
DM: No, no, no. I’ve been throwing dire wolves at you already. They’ll be winter wolves. They have cold breath!
Max: Bats. Sonic scream.
Sargassas: Sound hounds?

The party slowly ticks through their stock of sunrods as they set up watch order as Sargassas, Ralth, and Khoriane.

DM: So that’s the Affected By Nothing watch, the wolf watch, and then Khori is on the weasel watch.
Sargassas: (pointing at an Ikea catalogue) Oh my god, a pillow ladder! What the hell is this for?
Ralth: (picks up the catalogue, then hurls it away)
DM: Thank you, Ralth. 10 experience.
Ralth: I just… it was actually distracting me too.
DM: Five experience.

Ralth elects to search the entire room, and finds nothing. The pool begins to slowly drain as he does. The group mocks Max’s mini, which sort of looks like a giant fat guy throwing a whiny tantrum. The transcriber is encouraged to overtly lie about the quality of a pun, which was in truth of miserable caliber. The DM rolls Listen and Spot checks for the watches, each time claiming the watch is uneventful.

DM: Who do you pass your shift off to:
Ralth: (raises his hand)
DM: It was a pop quiz, I wanted to see if he’d pick someone else…

The next morning arrives… so to speak, because they’re underground and divorced from time. Sargassas reaches for books to prepare his spells.

Sargassas: I gotta see if I can actually pray for remove paralysis.
DM: No, you can not!
Sargassas: Isn’t that a fourth-level spell?
DM: As in, stop trying to cure the thing that’s keeping Dian out of the game in-character.

The players openly mock the fact that Dian is unable to act solely because his player isn’t here, describing him as a puppet and whatnot.

Sargassas: “No, something is wrong, we’re all puppets!” Oh no, he’s breaking the fourth wall!
DM: Your Wisdom has gone too high, you’ve discovered the secrets!
Sargassas: That’d be hilarious if there was a limit in the book. Your Wisdom cannot go above 50, you become self-aware at this point.
DM: “This way that grappling works, it doesn’t make any sense! Unless…”
Sargassas: At SOME point your character becomes self-aware.
DM: “This system of magic is arbitrary and pointless! Unless…”
Sargassas: “It’s some kind of balancing act!”

The DM attempts to crush a can of beer, but apparently fails, and the power of the drink in question is discussed.

DM: Remember, ‘lager’ almost rhymes with ‘slaughter’.
Ralth: (an extremely long pause as he digests this) Not… quite…
DM: I said ‘almost’.
Ralth: Not even really almost. They share an ER at the end, that’s really about it.
DM: And an ‘ahh’. LAHHger. SlAHHther.
Ralth: So does ‘laugh;.
DM: That’s more of an ‘ah’.
Ralth: LAHHff. British laugh.
DM: There’s no such thing! You know that! They’re too stoic a people!

The group discovers that the path does not continue beyond here, and furiously contemplates having to return the entire way back to the fork, which was hours of travel back. The DM shrugs, and somehow this turns into an elaborate shrug-striptease-thing, I don’t even know. They investigate the lake and discover that water seems to be flowing through minute cracks at the base of the pillar. Max furiously jumps up and down on the floor there, but accomplishes nothing.

Max: I try it again. I get a 26.
DM: Let me know when you get a roll around 50-something.
Max: Gimme a couple more dice…
Ralth: YOU’RE FATIGUED!
Max : I’m gonna attack the pillar. Try and break it, see if I can get under to whatever’s under there.
DM: Where’s the DMG? Lemme find my hardness.
Max: He’s sitting next to you, Ralth! The DM’s finding his hardness next to Ralth.
DM: You hit, roll your damage.
Max: Did I crit?
DM: You can’t crit stone.
Ralth: It does not feel.
Sargassas: Did he even beat the hardness? Oh, we don’t know yet, he hasn’t rolled his damage.
DM: Don’t worry, I’m beating my hardness as we speak.
Max: 18.
DM: A small chip of stone comes off. Good work.
Max: Is there anything under…?
DM: You have 530 hit points to go before you do any appreciable damage.
Max: (rolls dice repeatedly)
Ralth: You are fatigued!

The group begins arguing over the disposition of Dian and Iglar, eventually settling on making Iglar carry Dian despite Max being more suited for it. Max starts speaking with a Spanish accent, which causes Ralth intense pain.

Ralth: No, please don’t use that—
Max: AREBA!
Ralth: Noooooo…
Max: ANDELE!
Ralth: Ralth cuts his wrists. The right way.
DM: I’m sorry, Sargassas gives you fast healing.
Ralth: Damn it. I cut open Sargassas’s wrists. Sneak attack.
Sargassas: What you don’t realize is, Sargassas cast deafness on himself.
DM: Sorry, Ralth, you can’t beat his armor class. I’ve seen your stats.
Ralth: Yeah I can!
Sargassas: As you sneak up behind him, you realize that Sargassas doesn’t just not hear you. He DOESN’T hear you. He’s cast deafness on himself. As you look closely you can see blood dripping from where the ear holes are. They’re small dents as he’s bashed them in. You can see the pain in his eyes but there’s a smile on his lips.
DM: I guess you can never hear that annoying voice again. (Inferian voice) Meanwhile, elsewhere…
Max: (Cissy voice) YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

The group proposes to send the darkvision-possessing Max in front while the rest of them blindly follow behind. The DM describes this as unwise at best.

Ralth: All right, I squeeze Khori.
Max: GLOW, DAMN IT!
DM: Khori, Ralth is getting fresh!
Khoriane: He’s getting fresh?! (slapping one hand against the other)
Ralth: Ow.
DM: She slaps her hands together, it causes you pain for some reason.
Ralth: Sonic damage!

The group trudges back down the tunnel, only to discover the sharp turn they had found earlier is now a fork! The gnome wizard from before had hidden the other fork behind a silent image spell.

DM: So you all owe him one.
Khoriane: One swift kick in the ass?
Ralth: (cheerfully) I’ll tear him limb from limb. Limb from limb, I tells ya.

Down the hall they head! Water begins to flow down the tunnel, briefly inspiring brief alarm in the group as they ponder a flood. Sargassas attempts to roll Knowledge(geology), but doesn’t actually have it. Ralth spots two blue eyes peering at them from the water.

DM: As you notice it, the water rises up. Tiiiiny little elemental. (making beckoning motions)
Ralth: Is it beckoning us?
DM: Yes.
Ralth: Well, might as well follow it.
DM: Yes, follow directly into the trap. I mean plot. I mean. (mimes throwing a smoke pellet)
Sargassas: The DM has our character sheets. Let’s let the DM play everybody. The new D&D rules, since the DM took all our character sheet copies, he has to play everybody. And we want a good show. Put on a good show. Get some classic Sargassas rage in there.
He has to RP not only our character, but us as individuals.

The group follows the elemental like a train on the tracks. It leads them to a massive pool of water, which it then sinks into. Max attempts to sacrifice Dian to determine if the pool is safe. They briefly squabble over who will investigate.

Sargassas: I’m gonna jump in, because I have the highest Swim out of all of us.
Max: What’s your Swim?
Sargassas: It’s at 7 with all my bonuses.
Max: Man, I’m gonna jump in there because I have a better Swim that you.
Sargassas: Why, what’s yours?
Max: 10.
Sargassas: I can also breathe underwater.
Max: …yeah, okay.

Sargassas cracks a sunrod and heads for the center of the pool, where he discovers a giant hole with a current coming up out of it. He pokes around for a bit, then comes back up.

DM: There’s a hideous lizard monster bursting out of the water! What do you all do?
Ralth: I recognize him as our comrade and don’t do anything.
DM: You’re no fun.

Iglar’s player bursts in the door! Sargassas heads down the hole as he gets settled… and time passes. Sargassas fumes that the DM refuses to reveal what has happened. Iglar finally decides to be a good sport and go after him.

Iglar: Here. Max?
Max: I’m sleeping, I’m a narcoleptic.
Iglar: Poke poke poke.
Max: Nyarcklaamamama!
Iglar: “Here friend, hold the end of this rope. I’m going to sink down there in my armor, and if I pull the rope twice, pull me out.” A hundred feet of rope.
DM: Okay, let me put it to you this way…
Ralth: You’re dead.
Sargassas: Your teammates watch as your corpse floats to the top…

Ralth ties some rope together to give Iglar plenty of slack, and then Iglar zooms out into the center. He pops a sunrod as he sinks into the hole.

DM: Once he gets there, about fifty feet of rope reel out, and then it stops.
Sargassas: In the water, the rope swishes… (miming the rope wrapping around Iglar’s neck)
DM: Then the rest begins to reel in, until it becomes a steady pull.
Iglar: How many rounds have passed?
DM: At this point, seven.
Iglar: What does Iglar see?
DM: I’ll describe it depending on what everyone else does.
Max: Max is pulling you up, dude, because you can only hold your breath for four rounds.
Iglar: No, 20 rounds, so you’re supposed to pull me back after…
Max: Two tugs?
Ralth: It’s only one loooong tug.
DM: It’s exactly like out of a cartoon. “He never said what one long tug means!” And down below you see a guy being mauled by a squid.

Max rolls Strength to pull him back up, but the rope pops back up – with an untied knot where it had been tied together. Ralth, who had rolled the poor Use Rope check in question, grabs for it.

Ralth: What’s that!? (making slashing motions) Oh look, it’s frayed! Ooh, Sleight of Hand. I rolled a 19 on that.
Max: I’m going in. “IGLAR! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
DM: You swim furiously into the center and then dive.
Sargassas: Ha ha ha, I thought you said ‘die’!

Max establishes that he can’t see the light from the rods as he approaches the hole. Sargassas starts rolling up a new character.

Iglar: Have we been eaten by a grue?
Ralth: “We’re gonna have to go in after them, aren’t we.”
Khoriane: “Probably.”
Sargassas: That’s a crap stat. That is a crap stat.

The two head down. The DM declares the game over due to TPK… then describes them falling into the same prison cell with bars of water in a cavern that the pool of water is magically rising up from. Outside the cage, a massive water elemental and an elderly female dwarf watch the group, saying not a word.

Max: What happens when I touch the water of the bars?
DM: It feels almost solid.
Max: ALMOST. Solid.
Iglar: Give it a try, man, you know you want to!
Max: Yeah, I really, really do want to just bend the bars apart… Can I throw my body into it so water’s hitting me in the back, and I create a little hole the rest of the party can crawl out?
DM: You can certainly try, give me a Strength check.
Max: 18.
DM: You rear back, then hurl yourself at the water. Just as you’re about to connect with it, you see more water surge up so it becomes a solid plane which you slam into! But it has no give. As soon as you rebound off of it, the water flows back down so it’s just bars again.
Max: This sucks. Ow. All right, who’s got some poison on them? Let’s just poison the water.
Iglar: All right, let’s not talk about that, that might insult someone. “Oh elemental! Oh great, majestic…” (briefly cracking up) “Why have you imprisoned us here?!”
Sargassas: “Didn’ts I say you shoulds not speak!? You have angered MANY people with your words! Perhaps we should let someone else speak.”
DM: “He doesn’t speak Common anyway.”
Iglar: “Oh, well, it sounds like you do, ma’am.”
DM: “Aye, that I do. This the lot of ya, then?”
Iglar: “This is not the lot of us, we had one companion, we expected but a brief excursion, so he’s still lying paralyzed next to the lake.”

Khoriane sputters, while Sargassas attempts to kill Iglar.

DM: “Well points to ye for honesty, then. Though I’m sure yer companions didnae appreciate that, but I’ve got ta give ya credit for foolishness. I mean honesty.”
Iglar: “That’s all I get credit for these days, eh, Sargassas?”
Ralth: “Don’ts talks to mes.”

Iglar cheerfully tells the dwarf LITERALLY EVERYTHING, though Sargassas is the one who finally points out that they had slain an elemental during the fight with the gauth. The two of them cheerfully squabble like they used to in the old days.

Iglar: “Look, ma’am, I didn’t mean to hurt any water elemental, except I was attacked. In the heat of battle, I might add, with a vile eyeball monster the likes of which I had never laid eyes upon and which never came up in my trainings either.
Sargassas: It was a day he took off from class. “I don’t need to go to school.” “And today we’re going to talk about the eye monster, today is the only lesson for the eye monster…”
DM: “It was a gauth.”
Iglar: “Why did it attack us?”
DM: “That was its nature. Wanted your treasure. You may have noticed, it had a pile of it. As I happen ta see some of it adornin’ yer bodies now.”
Max: …that is a very NASTY sounding dwarf woman.
DM: It’s a dwarf woman! That’s redundant! Also she’s really damn old!

Sargassas furiously salivates with rage (literally), as he alternately berates Iglar and begs him to remember their past adventures.

Sargassas: “Remember the boat! Remember the undead kingdom! Shut up!”
Ralth: “Khori, get on his goddamn shoulder!”
DM: “Undead kingdom?”
Iglar: “Undead kingdom? Yes, we wandered through an undead kingdom—“
Sargassas: “OH MY GODS! What were we just talking about! Shut up!”
Khoriane: On his shoulder, shoving my wing in his mouth—
Iglar: Mmm mmm mmf mf mmmf mff!

The group banters with the dwarf for a bit, and the DM calls for Diplomacy checks… which leads to the group furiously arguing over who should be rolling!

DM: I love roleplaying encounters with you guy.
Sargassas: I TRY to roleplay!
DM: You all roleplay, that’s the problem, you’re all so incompatible! You fight like a well-oiled machine, but talking for ten seconds and you’re practically rolling initiative on each other…
Sargassas: I can’t even get to that point! I wanted to on the undead kingdom, now I gotta explain that for ten minutes, now there’s this—
Max: ALL RIGHT ROLL YOUR GODDAMNED DIPLOMACY!
Sargassas: I gotta DO it first!
Iglar: All right, I’m not gonna say anything. Nobody say anything. Sargassas has to do something.

One roll later, the dwarf agrees to let them go through the mountain unmolested in exchange for a task from them.

DM: “…Lost me accent for some reason. I’m too busy doing the growly voice to do the accent.”

The dwarf tasks them to defeat some undead that have crept just into the Elemental Plane of Water. Sargassas, who can speak Aquan, addresses the elemental directly to apologize and ask for aid.

DM: The water elemental replies in an ancient voice that sounds as cold and harsh as the ocean—
Max: “Fuck. Off.”

Iglar asks the druid to take care of Dian, which causes Sargassas to nearly explode in frustration.

DM: It’s all right! It’s in-character, even though out of character you get a total pass on it. Look at it this way, this druid will take him in, cure his paralysis, and next time a jet of water will spit him out onto you guys and it solves all of our problems.

The characters buff and prepare for combat, then step into the transport water bubble as the DM draws out the map and gets the minis ready. They appear in an ice cavern, facing an owlbear skeleton! Initiative is rolled.

Max: Man, I really hope we’re not fighting a fracking golem or construct or something that can’t be crit.
DM: It’s undead, dude!
Max: Good, they can be crit.
Sargassas: No, they can not.
Max: DAMN IT, DUDE!

Max charges forward to attack the skeleton, just as a pair of figures burst out of the crevices near the other figures. One of those figures strikes Khoriane for minimal damage, but it applies a negative level as well! On the other side, another pair of creatures scramble out of the crevices, but Ralth spots them and tries to get away. One of them attacks Sargassas…. And then everyone has to roll saving throws against the horrible stenches. Amazingly, no one fails. Sargassas also saves against paralysis, but Ralth is attacked and fails his saving throw.

DM: Ralth promptly goes rigid. Oh wait. (rolling dice) Ralth promptly goes rigid.
Sargassas: What are you ROLLING?! Are there multiple effects!?
DM: No, I rolled his concealment really quick.

Iglar turns and swings at one of the ghouls, striking it but not slaying it. Sargassas whips out his holy symbol and unleashes a turn on the foes, rolling well enough to affect all four of them. A flurry of AOOs erupt as the undead scramble to the back of the chamber, while Max pounds the owlbear skeleton into dust.

Iglar: What are these undead doing back there? They’re cowering?
Sargassas: “They’s run… from the holy might of my symbol!”
Iglar: Oh, that’s what they’re doing!
DM: What did you THINK they were doing?!

Sargassas flips through his spell list, trying to help Ralth, while the undead are pounded down by the rest of the fighters.

Sargassas: I wanna recognize exactly what’s happened to him.
DM: Give me a Knowledge(religion) check.
Khoriane: He’s got a stiffy!
Ralth: I AM a stiffy.

The players congratulate themselves on actually managing to shut down an encounter effectively in this campaign.

Sargassas: Wave 1 destroyed. 22 waves to go.
Max: Enemy health times 2.
Sargassas: Skulls activated! Improved critical skull, on!

The group leaves, failing to loot the bodies. The group furiously panics and curses the DM even as he assures them he won’t rob them like that. The druid lazily waves them off with the promise that they’ll go unmolested, though Sargassas presses for details.

DM: “Just don’t mess with the elementals. Don’t do any major acts of water pollution.”
Sargassas: I look over to the side, Iglar and Max are just popping and pissing all over the water…
DM: They’re dropping their barrels of radioactive waste in. “This seems like a good place to get rid of these.”
Sargassas: “All this oil, I’ve been using.”
Max: “Unless it involves little boys, I want nothing to do with molesting!”
Khoriane: Oh Jesus Christ.

The DM claims that the description for one item takes up two whole sheets of his campaign notes (which, considering some of his descriptions of items, is not wholly implausible). Khoriane successfully begs a restoration spell off the druid.

DM: You receive 1700 gold pieces. Each gold coin is inscribed with the face of the majestic -- (spotting Sargassas’s expression, he cracks up)
Sargassas: I knew it! I was thinking, “He’s going to describe the coins.” You have 900 gold pieces with the face of Mickey Mouse, 500 with the face of an undead lord…
DM: 1700 gold, 5000 silver.
Iglar: Who are they inscribed with?
DM: I don’t fucking CARE, Iglar.

With treasure distributed, the druid cautions them that their path leads them through the gnome city.

Sargassas: I was actually trying to see if I could make a pact, and then I could summon somewhat better water monsters with my summon spell.
DM: Points for effort, though. Not experience points, just generic points.
Sargassas: I was hoping, if I had a favor from him, instead of summoning a small monster, I could get a slightly larger water elemental.
DM: You can! When you get another level of summon monster.
Sargassas: I KNOW. I was hoping to find a workaround.
DM: Sorry I didn’t let you break the power curve.
Iglar: You could do something gay, like, “from now on I give you a boon, all your warer elementals will sparkle softly.”
Sargassas: They glow in the sunlight.

The group begins wearily envisioning the worst for dealing with the gnome city, interspersed with ludicrously blind optimism.

Sargassas: “Do you have a disguise kit?”
Ralth: “Maaaaaybe…”
Iglar: “Could you disguise all of us as –“
Sargassas: “It’s a bit much.”
Ralth: “Are – are you truly asking that question?!”
Sargassas: What kind of a Disguise roll would you need to disguise any of the large creature to look like a gnome.
Ralth: Or even the Medium sized creatures!
Sargassas: He disguises them as a bunch of gnomes working together…

Ralth furiously attempts to take a 20 on a Disguise check, despite this being impossible. Iglar becomes complicit in attempting to game the system.

Iglar: Iglar will try to recognize you! All right, I’m going to turn around, you say when you’re ready, then I’m gonna turn around and see if I can recognize you.

Ralth disguises himself, and Khoriane quickly UMDs a scroll of darkvision on him, allowing him to proceed well ahead of the group without penalty. Advancing down the passageway, Ralth comes to light at a T intersection! To the right, a pit with spikes at the bottom; to the left, the path slopes dramatically upwards.

Ralth: Well. Bluff, don’t fail me now!
DM: Before you get halfway up, a gnomish face pops up over the barricade.
Ralth: “Hail!”
DM: “What’s the password!”
Ralth: “Just getting back from scouting, need to get in!”
DM: “…what’s the password?”
Ralth: “Oh hell, what is it this week?”
Sargassas: …god.. DAMN IT, DM! Planning ahead!
Ralth: “You know what? I can not remember, guys.”
DM: Wanna roll a quick Bluff check?
Ralth: 19. “Well, they sent me out to scout ahead for some stuff, and I’m just getting back, they must have blurted out the password—“
DM: “Blurted?! Did you say blurted?”
Ralth: “Yeah… y-yeah.”
DM: Come on up!
Sargassas: Nice one, Ralth.
DM: As you get within 15 feet, another gnome pops up, this one has a bow nocked.
Ralth: “Whoa, what’s up?”
DM: He promptly fires it at you! Sorry, the dice were against you on every single roll. They saw through your Disguise immediately.
Ralth: Really. That’s a good Spot.
DM: If by one point. Both of them rolled a 17.

Ralth slams a potion of spider climb and scrambles up onto the tunnel wall. One of them uses a spell on Ralth, but he shakes it off; the other fires his bow. Ralth hurls a thunderstone between the two of them, deafening one! The deaf one is unable to locate Ralth, but the other one fires his bow at Ralth! Ralth scrambles down the wall, stabbing one of the gnomes, but swiftly realizes that his damage output without his sneak attack isn’t up to the task of soloing these two, and after a few more blows, retreats to rejoin the group.

Iglar: “What’d I miss, what’d I miss?!”
Ralth: “It didn’t work.”
Iglar: “Oh, I see you look like a pincushion. Har har har.”
Ralth: (mimes backstabbing Iglar)

Believing they can slay the guards without alerting the main city, the group swiftly buffs in preparation for battle. Max, mostly asleep, passes control of his character to Iglar.

DM: This ought to be good… Ralth, you’re first!
Ralth: I hold my action!

Khoriane zips forward, but her angle is terrible and the gnomes have a hefty bonus. She blasts the barricade instead. Max zips around, steps on the incline, and promptly has to roll a Balance check as water now sheets it.

Iglar: Uh-oh. 5.
DM: He takes two steps forward, promptly falls, and slides backwards into the pit.
Iglar: Can Iglar try to grab him?
DM: Yes, but it will be difficult. I’ll let you make a Reflex saving throw to grab him.
Iglar: 15.
DM: No, that will not be enough. Now he needs to make a Reflex saving throw against the pit.
Iglar: Ooh, he rolled better. 22.
DM: He is clinging to the edge, but he has not fallen down yet. Sargassas?
Sargassas: I’m not picking up him.
Iglar: Come on, produce flame up there or something.
Sargassas: I don’t have any decent spells yet, I’m only level five!

Iglar hauls Max up, but the DM immediately calls for more Balance checks as a wave of slick, slippery oil slams into them from the incline. Despite his Body Equilibrium buff, Iglar rolls a 2 and falls on his ass. Khoriane flies up to just below the barrier and immediately triggers a spiked-chain trap, which damages her for 8 but fails to trip her! Max attempts to Balance his way up the incline, but fails and slips yet again, sliding just down to the bottom. Sargassas attempts to summon a monster, while Iglar seizes a rope from Max and begins lumbering up the incline. The gnomes furiously fire through a magic fog cloud while Ralth leaps up on the summoned celestial wolf. With the rope hooked onto nothing, Max begins climbing it.

DM: You’re going to definitely need to give me a Balance check, because you’re only holding the rope, and 500 pounds of half-ogre is pulling it down.
Iglar: Iglar weight quite a bit in this situation too. I think he’s got 8 times the weight, which would make him 2400 pounds.
DM: I’m aware, but it’s still gonna require a Balance check as a 500 pound pull hits.
Iglar: This was the plan, it’s not like it’s a surprise!
DM: But still, it’s a sudden change.

They argue over this for a while till Iglar finally persuades the DM to make it a Strength check instead, which he passes. Khoriane blasts an injured gnome.

Ralth: Ha haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa thunderstone again!
DM: Ha! Where are you dropping it?
Ralth: Right here? Little farther back…
DM: One of them does not react to the thunderstone going off at all. The other one winces and frowns. “Who the hell keeps doing that?! Why?!” For the record, the other one was still deaf.
Iglar: Hey Khori, when Iglar gets closed, move past them and I’m going to use Dimensional Swap to drop a Max Bomb on them.
Ralth: A Max Bomb?!
DM: So Max is farting, is that what I’m understanding?
Iglar: Is that a special ability for ogres? I need to look them up…

The wolf is not tripped, but IS damaged by the spiked chain. The gnomes and some of the smaller creatures trade shots and blows.

Iglar: The gnome sees that a screen of force parts this mist in this general area and a very pissed-off half-giant appears. He sees the flying creature and says, “Get your axe ready, Max!” Bwrrrrrrr, Dimensional Swap!

Max and Khoriane swap places, and Max hefts his axe!

Khoriane: MAX SMASH!
Iglar: Ooo. Six plus… eleven, plus one… so 18.
DM: The Max Bomb gutters out like someone snuffed its fuse. Ralth, a Fortitude saving throw.
Ralth: “You’re paralyzed.” Awww… actually that was not good. 14.
DM: You promptly go blind as the gnome in front of you shrieks a few words.

Sargassas furiously attempts to argue that the darkvision spell should cancel out the blindness, but to no effect. The group surges forward dramatically, all of them advancing on the two gnomes now that they have a foothold.

DM: The spiked chain lashes out! The two chains on it promptly tangle around each other and the whole mechanism grinds to a halt.
Sargassas: Woo! Wa ha ha, one! Yes!
Ralth: Fire erupts, igniting the oil. Uh-oh!
Iglar: Iglar takes a five foot step and goes boooom!
DM: Iglar misses.
Iglar: Darn it. Can I roll?
Sargassas: Yes, you can roll.
Iglar: Thank you. That’s better, 15 plus eight plus one… 23.
DM: You hit.
Iglar: (rolling) Oh sweetness. 6, 6, 6, 4.
DM: It’s dead!
Iglar: Hold on. 22… plus…
DM: It’s DEAD.
Iglar: 20 points of damage.
DM: All right, you just did almost as much damage as it had already taken in one blow. Max!
Iglar: Roar!
DM: You hit. It’s dead. And the gnomes are vanquished.
Ralth: I can’t believe two fucking gnomes gave us this much trouble. Damn you, defenses.
DM: Hey, it’s a thinking man’s encounter.
Sargassas: Look, this whole encounter would’ve been so much better if they hadn’t rolled so well on the fucking disguise check!
Iglar: “Well guys, my mind is pretty much ready for a rest, and that was two gnomes.”

Ralth abruptly remembers he’s blind. Sargassas realizes that the spell is permanent, and Ralth is forever blind! He promptly produces a scroll of remove blindness and solves that problem.

Ralth: “Oh, I can see again. Thank you.”
DM: His lack of gratitude offends your god!
Ralth: That’s as much gratitude as Ralth can have…

Sargassas proposes they camp at this outpost and kill each patrol change as they come through, which the gnomes will surely never figure out. Ralth refuses to go along with another disguise plan.

Sargassas: “They were suspicious of us from the start.”
Khoriane: “They’re suspicious anyway. I’m familiar with swir-sef-sur – with them anyway.”

Ralth immediately plunders the continual-flame rods on the wall, solving their light problems forever. The group heads on down the tunnel a ways, only to hear voices speaking in the distance, clearly approaching them. Around the corner come six gnomes, all of them garbed like a distinct class.

Sargassas: Damn it, I wish Neko, the Price Gouging Cat was here, so I could buy some flash bombs from him.
DM: They pause as they notice the darkness ahead. “Someone’s disabled the torches!” “Ha, I bet it’s the work of our fiendish opponents.” They step forward a little bit more, and then stop. The one with the sword and shield steps forward, bangs his sword on his shield. “Come out, villains! Come out and be vanquished!” He’s calling this in gnomish so only Ralth understands it.
Max: That’s okay. Max screeches and charges down the hallway.

Ralth hurls a thunderstone into the middle of them, deafening five of the six, while Khoriane UMDs a lightning bolt out of a wand. Max furiously takes back his charge, Khoriane traces her line, and the DM takes off three.

Iglar: They’re down?!
DM: Yes!
Sargassas: (howling with laughter)
Iglar: Iglar steps forward. SURRENDER NOW!
DM: You’re rolling an Intimidate.
Sargassas: No! No! No! He threw the rock and they’re deaf! They don’t hear you!
Max: Do you speak Gnomish?
Iglar: Iglar is using the universal language of “Drop to your knees and shit your pants.”
Max: They did just shit their pants at seeing three of their buddies drop dead.
Khoriane: Did I kill three of them?!
DM: YES! (so upset at having to constantly answer the same question over and over again that he actually stomps into the kitchen to curse and swear incoherently for a while)
Sargassas: DM! DM! I have a very important question!
Ralth: You’re going to break him.

The group wades through the group of gnomes like a hot knife through butter, slaying every one but one who fainted, losing total bowel control in the process. The group pats themselves on the back for this.

DM: Didn’t you notice how easily you took these guys down?
Ralth: They must have been, like, level 1s.
Max: I feel like they’re the equivalent of Starfleet’s red squadron.
Ralth: They’re like us starting out on their first adventure, but they got destroyed because their DM sucks.
DM: Ralth got it in one. An innocent group of gnomish first-level adventurers, setting out to defend their hometown from the depredation of a rampaging band of monsters. That is exactly what it was.
Ralth: That’s BEAUTIFUL!
Max: That’s great. That was ROTC…
DM: I thought you guys would appreciate an easy battle with a tinge of guilt.

Iglar abruptly loses a game of homophobe chicken, to his immense surprise and confusion. Unable to interrogate till the deafness wears off, the group adjourns for the night, with doom and despair awaiting them!