Servants of Vecna: Solari in the Castle

My apologies for the completely unedited nature of these game notes. I may go back and fix them later if I have time, but right now I just wanted to get them up here where the rest of the group can see them.

We open again in the tower, with the lot of standing around figuring out what to do next.

The consensus is that Chuck can spider climb up to the roof, Jenny can climb up the rope.

A man appears at the top of the stairs. "Violette, are you okay? What's going on up here? I thought I heard some crashing and HOLY FUCK!" He casts Mirror Image, which is going to be annoying.

Durest, who is still flying from the last session, scoops up Hatch and heads for the roof. Chuck leans back over the edge of the roof and attempts to dominate the guy. The guy utterly fails to resist, so Chuck hands him the bit of stolen loot that set of the dragon statue. "If anybody else shows up, hand them this and tell them that Ann is waiting for them in the dragon room.

It takes us a couple of hours to get to the keep. It's wood. Bad guys include Solari (red) elites (yellow) and regular troops (green).

Chuck volunteers to go cause some chaos in the back so our invisible butts can come in through the front. After a bit of discussion, Chuck summons some wolves (six of them) and we wait until they arrive. Chuck then circles to the back of the complex, get the attention of the Ranger Solari back there, and tries to dominate him.

The ranger starts taking shots at Chuck, who does the Matrix whooshy-dodge. Ranger: "WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!"

Chuck attempts to dominate the ranger again, and this time he succeeds. Taking control of the ranger's mind, he turns him on the archers guarding the walls.

Ramekin makes Jenny invisible, and hatch begins to move towards the door. The wolves head for the front gates, and the two guards out front retreat; Durest commands his frost giant skeleton to pick up himself and Jenny and put them on the wall.

The defenders are starting to realize that they're in trouble; one of the walltop archers takes a shot at the wolves, but misses. The ranger, meanwhile, is just mowing down the mass of spearmen, who are confused and terrified and try to run away.

The wolves reach the gate and begin mauling the guards there, pulling one down. Chuck assumes mist form and moves towards the wall. Hatch heads for the gate (invisible). Bob the skeletal frost giant (move 40) crosses to the wall.

The remaining troops are trying to tangle with the wolves, and manage to take one out. The ranger, meanwhile, takes out one of the archers on the alls. A group of troops emerge from the side of the estate, and Chuck drops a fireball on them and annihilates them. Hatch charges across the bridge; Bob places Jenny and Durest on the wall.

Jenny charges the nearest offer and slaps him with her spiked chain so hard that he explodes.

Several troopers move to intercept Jenny; others retreat towards the house, yelling alarums. The two facing the wolves utterly fail to damage any. Joelle the ranger continues to murder his friends on Chuck's behalf, and Chuck instructs him to shoot anybody who comes out of the building. Chuck descends to the courtyard.

Ramekin flies over one of the gate guards and hits him with Shocking grasp, losing his invisibility but killing the guy; Hatch takes adavntage of the chance to move through the gap. Durest moves up behind Jenny, while Bob wades towards the gate.

A trio of guards charges Jenny, who hits them with a ferocious series of countercuts. They die. "Och, an' I've never seen anybody charge into a meat grinder like that!" Durest observes.

A couple of the archers try to shoot at Jenny, to no good effect.

Chuck, still around the back, sees some nobly-dressed men and women looking at him out of a window; he decides to cast Shield on himself.

The spearmen move up on Jenny, and she mows down a bunch of them. Hatch starts making his way over to Chuck. Bob reaches the gate and cuts down a guard; Durest gets close enough to wipe out ten of the spearmen with Mass Inflict Light Wounds.

Chuck, meanwhile, is assaulted by troops moving from the house; Joelle puts arrows through three of them. More troops emerge and attack Chuck; three of them die. He counters with burning hands, taking out six of them. The wolves are now free of the gate, and can attack the handful of remaining spearmen; so can Bob. Jenny finishes all but one of them as Durest moves down and sets up next to the corpses.

The troops from the house tangle with Chuck and get hurt; the spearmen take that as their cue to back off. Joelle contines to assist his new master, Chuck, and takes out four of the newly-emerged troops. Chuck: "Have your wolf take these guys out too!"

He drops another Burning Hands, annihilating a bunch of archers. Hatch, still invisible, comes up behidn the line troops and tears into them with rays of frost, while Ramekin attacks another group and kills five of them.

Durest raises a unit of twenty skeletons, and Bob splats the last spearman. Jenny races across the courtyard to come up behind spearmen.

An arrow finally connects with Chuck, creasing his earlobe. Joelle takes out more dudes, while the spearmen move to attack Jenny. This was probably not a wise decision; three of them die, and Jenny is... slightly bruised. The next group doesn't take the hint, and three of them die as well doing no more damage than the first crowd. The the last group loses four people.

Then the wolves arrive, and the screaming starts. Chuck drops some magic missiles to break the circle of fighters around them. The Ranger's familiar wolf disdains to eat minor warriors, and Hatch continues firing off ranged attacks at the group, while Ramekin continues harrying another group. Durest sends Bob and Skeleton Troop Alpha to help the others, which spooks the spearmen. They start to retreat, and Jenny kills a few more as they move out of range. Durest, meanwhile, is making a second troop of skeleton: S Club 2.

Jenny kills a few more.

Chuck continues dodging attacks, and Joelle takes out more archers. The spearmen continue retreating. Chuck steps out of his encirclement, and wipes out four of this attackers.

Durest sends S Club 2 to form up in front of the front door, with orders to kill anyone who comes out. He then moves over to watch the other side of the house. Jenny, meanwhile, is cleaving and slaying; she is positively spathic.

One of the wolves finally dies, but the wolves and the skeletons tear into them. Chuck drops an Acid Arrow on the guy who actually managed to hit him. Hatch proceeds to the side door of the house and searches it for traps.

Bob the frost giant reaches a group of spearmen and begins smashing them; S Club 1 and the wolves continue the work, while Durest circles around to make sure nobody's escaping out the far side of the house. Jenny scythes through the last of the arechers.

Joelle continues murdering his co-workers, and the wolves tear into the last of the spearmen. Chuck kills his last attacker, and joins the others at the door.

Hatch opens the door, and discovers a rather large barracks.

Durest, meanwhile, has reached the far side of the house and posted up in front of the door there.

The other four have passed through the empty barracks. Durest directs Bob to stand guard, and heads back around to the others. We continue to search the keep, finding a training room, and maybe an officers' study? Hatch can see through another doorway to an open entryway. He opens another door and finds an officer's quarters -- probably Joelle's, based on the clothes in the armoire.

We're still missing three Solari.

The next room is a horrible mess; somebody has been practicing axe-throwing against one wall. Smelly, dirty clothes litter the room; likely this is the orc solari's room. The next one is probably Florian, a good-looking ranger that some of us had met previously; he keeps a stock of his own merch in his room. The next door is locked.

Hatch searches for traps, and open locks. Despite the lock, the room is empty and looks abandoned. We search for secret doors, but find nothing.

So, we head back to the door that led to the exposed front entryway; Jenny takes the lead this time, strolling past the desk, and comes around a corner to see a couple of guards trying to be sneaky behind some statues. Jenny: "Yoohoo! Boys!"

The swordsmen on the ground floor move to attack her and die. One remains. There are archers on the balcony, but Jenny isn't exposed to them yet.

Chuck moves up to inspect the desk. There are three letters: one says we should use the Chateau as a reward for loyal service; there's a blank deed in the study. Next: definitely need to have the walls repaired behind the throne. Third: Baron, we really shouldn't keep the treasure off your chambers.

Hatch goes to check the wall, Durest moves into hall, and Jenny kills the last of the guards here. The archers move up and shoot at Jenny, but miss. Chuck moves around to search behind the throne itself, finding nothing of note. Durest and Jenny head up the stairs, with Jenny in the lead; she kills two archers.

Chuck continues checking behind the throne but finds nothing. Hatch continues checking the wall and finds a secret door. "Oy! Check it out!"

Durest gives up on the stairs, and heads back over to Hatch. Jenny, still equipped with the ring of Feather Fall, leaps off the side and comes to the secret door.

Hatch opens the secret door. There's a short passage to a pair of ladders. The ladders go up to trap doors. Jenny goes up one ladder and finds herself in a hallway. "It's a hallway with no doors. Maybe somebody does the search while I check the other ladder?"

Hatch comes up to search, while Jenny tries the other ladder. Hatch finds a secret door, which he checks for traps; he opens it, and finds more corridor.

Jenny and Durest proceed around one passage; Jenny can hear crying, then: "Shush! They're coming!"

Hatch retreats and comes up behind Jenny and Durest; he and Chuck join us, just in time for us to reach a dead end and check for secret doors. Hatch finds one, and it opens into a waiting room.

Hatch: "Step aside, I'm about to do subterfuge." He checks, but doesn't find any secret doors.

Now Jenny can hear growling through the wall. Maybe a bear? We find another secret door.

Jenny: "Excellent! When you open this, Hatch, I think you die. So maybe you get out of the way, let the big kids take care of this, sweet thing."

Hatch finds no traps, so he opens the door. Beyond is a very fancy bedroom with three people in it. The first one attacks Chuck three times, but fails to connect.

There are three Solari and a bear inside. One is a monk, one is a ranger, and one is the orc - probably barbarian. Jenny rages, steps in, and power attacks the bear... but misses.

Florian the ranger fires off several shots with his bow, hitting Jenny twice. Jenny is... not impressed. Chuck attempts to dominate Florian, who manages to shake it off. Hatch hands Ramekin a shocking grasp, and Ramekin promptly flies in to zap Gularax the orc, who's wearing a mythril breastplate. Durest steps in immediately after and tries for Slay Living, but fails to kill Guralax; he just takes damage. Jenny attacks past Durest and slays the bear.

Guralax attacks Durest, hitting only once, but doing an impressive amount of damage. The monk does a bit more damage, and the ranger puts a couple of arrows in Durest, leaving him badly damaged.

Chuck dominates the pretty ranger Florian and tells him to start shooting his friends. Hatch drops Displacement on Durest, and Ramekin tries to fly back out but gets cut down by Gularax. Durest steps out of the flank and hits Gularax with Inflict Critical.

Jenny tags Gularax pretty hard, but not hard enough to kill him; Florian puts some arrows in him, which helps but still doesn't take him down. Gularax attacks Jenny, doing insane amounts of damage.Sophie moves back out of the way, probably to guard the important door.

Chuck fires off Magic Missiles at the orc. Hatch makes himself invisible. Ramekin is bleeding out and Hatch moves into the room; Durest tags Gularax with another Inflict Critical and drops him.

The monk throws flaming shuriken at Durest. They bounce off his armor. Florian unloads a rapid shot on the monk, hitting her twice. Chuck unloads a Magic Missile on Sophie the monk, then Hatch follows up with Scorching Ray.

Durest stabilizes Jenny, then steps over and takes partial cover behind the bear. Florian, meanwhile, fills his fellow Solari full of arrows and she goes down.