Good!Party: Almonda's Ambush

So we’ve had this huge break while the DM was out of town. And now we’re back. 

We emerge from the Nine Halls, and after a bit of strategizing Ruin and Martini head up the stairs to scout. We come up into a high open space. There’s a partially assembled boat in front of us; wind is whipping around us. Almonda the lieutenant of Duke Lamont and general torturer-bunny, is hiding behind some crates. (She’s a halfling.) She back there with two half-orc with tattoos of blood drops – members of he Blood of Vecna. A couple of ogres are standing in front of them. 

Martini slips out of the top of the stairwell and into the half-built ship. Ruin waits at the top of the stairs as she makes her way across. Everyone else waits at the bottom of the stairs. 

One of the ogres turns around towards Martini’s position; Ruin clears his throat and the ogre turns back around. Almonda hisses, “Biscuit!” The ogre opens a door, and one of a bunch of ogres comes out and looks down the stairs. Ruin pulls his cloak up and just… fades into the wall. It's not magic, he's just good. The ogre turns around and shrugs, having failed to see him. 

Martini slips off the boat and delivers her Death Attack to Almonda. She starts to attack, but Almonda flinches and Martini goes still. Leira sneezes delicately. 

Almonda says, “Something’s wrong! They’re already in here! Get out here! Unleash the donk!”

Ruin takes out the ogre who’s standing beside him. Another ogre charges him and swings a greatclub, but misses. Geddy starts up the stairs, but he’s old and slow. Marshall comes clanking up the stairwell. Almonda: “They’re here! Hold your ground.” 

Martini stabs her, and a bunch of mirror images burst out around her. Martini’s attack removes one of the images instead. She continues stabbing, clearing out more images. By the time she finishes, there are only two images left but Almonda is unharmed. “You didn’t really think that was going to work?” Almonda casts a wall of force to isolate Martini with nothing but the open edge of the bay behind her; she then drops a quickened Fire Shield on herself. 

A hulking corpse emerges from the far side of the skyport. Geddy shuffles up a couple of steps and shoots the acid crossbow at the hulking corpse. Marshall bull rushes the ogre lieutenant, using his weight and armor to attempt to shove past him. The ogre lieutenant attacks him on the way in, then tries not to get pushed aside; he fails, and Marshall pushes him back fifteen feet. Ruin gapes. Tavros charges one of the Ogre Lieutenants, cutting into him. 

Martini drops backwards off the ledge, landing on the ledge one floor down. The two half-orcs guarding Almonda just gape at her. Almonda: “See! She has jumped to her death to escape me.”

Leira steps up with her staff, preparing to target her with an Intensified Darkbolt. She uses the magic missile crossbow to take out a mirror image first. 

Almonda responds with a maximized fireball. She hits everybody except Martini. She follows up with a quickened scorching ray. We all take damage, but the ogres die and the hulking corpse takes some damage too. She cackles maniacally. 

The hulking corpse shambles forward and bites Ruin for a bit of damage. The remaining ogre lieutenant attacks Marshall, hitting him twice. Ruin turns and cuts down the hulking corpse. Geddy fires off a magic missile to remove the last image. 

Tavros charges the ogre, taking a hit on the way in. He cuts into the thing, and it feels it. It’s still blocking the way to Almonda, though. Downstairs, Martini has reached the bottom of the stairs. Leira fires off the staff, doing a huge amount of damage. Almonda staggers back… “How? Luthien said you would have no magic!”

She responds with Bigby’s Crushing Hand, which promptly grapples Leira and starts crushing. She follows with another quickened Scorching Ray, and takes Marshall down. The ogre attacks Tavros twice, missing both times; Tavros grins. Then he cuts down the ogre lieutenant and shoves a crate into Almonda, pinning her between the crate and her own Wall of Force. Martini races into the room, sees Almonda, and throws her dagger… 

Tavros leans slightly to the side as the dagger hurtles past and buries itself in her eye socket. Almonda dies. Ruin: “See? I told you this was a good plan.”

Martini spots some additional wizards who have been waiting to flank us. Leira puts her back to the boat and waves her staff around in a somewhat intimidating fashion. The wizards creep to the entrance of the room, and cast Mirror Image on themselves. Ruin steps in to the Blood of Vecna and cuts hims down with a flurry of blows. 

Geddy notes the wizards and uses Magic Missile to take out one of their images. 

The remaining Blood of Vecna rages and decides that he’s going to be the one to take down the King of Sol Povos. He attack skillfully, hitting Tavros three times. Tavros turns and severs his jugular with the barest edge of his blade. 

Leira goes over and tries to stabilize Marshall, and almost succeeds. The Wizards/Thoughts of Vecna decide to attack, and cast Hideous Laughter on Leira. She ignores them both. 

Ruin switches to his bow and clears out one wizard’s images. He then moves over in front of them. Tavros follows, putting himself in position as well. Martini tumbles past them and comes up behind the wizards. 

Leira manages to stabilize Marshall. 

The thoughts of Vecna are fanatics, despite being in a really bad position. They try to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. One of them casts Mirror Image again; the other fires off a lightning bolt at Martini, in a stunning display of bad judgement. It utterly fails to connect. Ruin uses Manyshot again and wipes out all but one of the images on one mage; Geddy takes out his last one just as Marshall wakes up. 

Tavros attacks, killing him, and then attacks the remaining wizard, clearing out most of his images. Martini finishes him. 

We start searching. This side room is a wood construction shop, and the ogres and Thoughts were living here so we take 24k in loot from the room. 

Martini searches the far workroom but doesn’t find anything; she follows a hallway and removes a trap on the door. There’s a fully functional and finished  airship engine inside. We open the Nine Halls, and Ruin and Tavros carry the massively heavy engine inside. Now we just need to put it on a ship. 

Martini moves to check the next door for traps, having just acquired an Energy Drain trap from the last one. The door, however, isn’t trapped; it appears to be an office. It’s well appointed, with fine examples of North Povian craftsmanship. These are Almonda’s second set of books, the ones where she was diverting funds for her own use. We will eventually be able to retrieve a full 210,000 GP worth of funds from Almonda’s embezzlement stash. Martini checks the next door, which is locked but not trapped; she opens it and finds Almonda’s personal treasure trove, worth about 85,000 GP. We swipe it.

Ruin sets fire to the boat, because he is a petty bitch. 

We heal up a bit, then Martini and Ruin creep further up the stairs. We can see a bit of hallway… and bunch of people chanting. We creep forward, and find a large room with a lot of people chanting in it. There’s a door behind them, so Martini looks it over to see if she can lock it. Ruin can hear three beholders in the room beyond. Martini jams the door and sets up an Energy Drain trap on it. 

Then Martini sneaks into the room, avoiding the notice of the chanters, and finally locating... Kas Luthien. 

Oh, we are so going to have to kill that guy.