Keraptas Retrieval


Dramatis Personae:
Frank -- Tarva -- 1/2 Celestial, 1/16 Fey, 7/16 Human -- Fighter 6th, Bard 4th, Celestial "2nd" -- 154 hp
Bee  --  Mia -- Elf -- Scout 12th -- 126 hp
Meggie  --  Becky  -- Half-Orc -- Barbarian 1st, Fighter 11th -- 172 hp
Freddie  --  Gerald  -- Elf -- Sorcerer 12th -- 84 hp

Hired as one of three groups to retrieve magical artifacts (weapons++) that have been stolen.  Our task is to retrieve "Wave", a high powered trident.  We are given the following poem/clue:

<to be added later>

Our employers have already figured out that "feather plumed mound" refers to the "<later>" mountain.  We spend several uneventful days traveling there, find a trap (not "trapped") door with a ring that Becky pulls up to reveal a metal spiral staircase [A] descending into darkness.  Tarva with darkvision goes first, followed by Becky, Gerald and Mia.  60' down the staircase ends in a west-heading corridor drowned in 2' of water (half-speed).  We regroup at the foot of the stairs and then proceed in the same order and spacing as before.  But first Heart's Reach tells Tarva that something about this place is contesting with him, and he'll need to concentrate on fighting it off, so he won't be able to participate as fully as usual.  Between them, they decide that he'll try to make himself Keen for the duration of the adventure.  Gerold and Becky are rather surprised, and somewhat disbelieving, at the concept of a self-aware, talking sword.

See map for diagrams of all the following.


Adventure A: BlackRazor


At the turn north Tarva peeks around the corner and sees a gynosphinx -- sitting on a mound of bones which keeps her out of the water -- at an intersection [C] of two branching corridors.  Tarva suggests trying to negotiate, rather than just charging to kill, and goes first, with Becky following closely behind just in case.  Tarva says, "Hello.  Are you trapped?  Would you like our help getting out of here?"  "I have no desire to leave," it replies.  "If you wish to pass, you must answer my riddle."

About this time Mia suddenly stops moving and drops her bow.  She has been stunned by a Symbol in the ceiling [B] that Tarva activated by walking under it, but that nobody could see until light stones came closer.  Mia comes out of it before anyone else has time to notice and react, and disgustingly pulls her soggy bow out of the murky water.  Gerald uses Spellcraft to determine that it is a Symbol of Stunning.

Tarva says that she would much prefer a non-violent interaction.  The gynosphinx wants to know which of the three corridors we are seeking passage into.  We decide to go with the traditional "left".  And are given the following riddle:

West Passage
Three lives have I.
Gentle enough to soothe the skin,
Light enough to caress the sky,
Hard enough to crack rocks.
What am I?

Becky says that this is obviously "water".  And the rest of us decide that she is right.  We each have to provide the answer individually, which we do.  After which we are allowed to pass into the left corridor.  At this point we rearrange our marching order to put Mia in front to check for traps, Tarva, Gerald, and Becky as rear guard.  A few feet down this corridor Mia spots another (different) Symbol in this ceiling [D].  Becky lifts Mia up so she can examine it, with the intent of disarming it, but discoveres that it is not currently armed.  Gerald attempts to use Spellcraft to find out what kind of Symbol it is, but does not succeed.

A short while later Mia warns us that there is a pit, hidden under the murky water.  By feel, she determines that there are no side-edge lips: it is the entire width of the corridor.  Tarva takes a sunrod, ties the non-tip end to a rope, ignites it, and tosses it 15' forward.  It shines through the 2' of water, indicating that the pit doesn't extend that far.  Pulling the sunrod back slowly, it suddenly starts sinking about one-third of the way back to us.  And rapidly disappears as the murky water blocks its light.  Pulling it up, and then dropping it straight down, determines that the pit is about 10' deep.  Tarva jumps across with a rope, then uses the rope to steady the others.  Gerold's jump is short, and he falls into the water, but is quickly pulled to the far side and back out.

The corridor turns north again (it had been north-northwest) and we can see that the 50' length has ten 6'x6' copper plates: five along each wall [F].  Mia senses a trap, but can't get a good feel for what's wrong.  Tarva tosses the sunrod 35' in front of us, so it will provide light a little past the end of the copper plates (the corridor opens up into a space we can't see into yet).  After a few moments the sunrod starts shining much brighter than normal, stays that way for a while, and then goes out (long before its normal lifespan).  When we pull the rope back, the knot appears to have been charred through.  We speculate that this trap heats metal, and anyone trying to move along the corridor would be burnt up by their armor, weapons, etc.

Mia thinks it might be possible for her to disable it.  She'll need to work on each copper plate one at a time.  To help her out, Tarva sings Inspire Competence to Mia and stays close to her.  Mia does disable all ten, but with occasional first-try failures, each of which heats the metal on her and burns her with progressively worsening amounts of damage.  

Once the plates are disabled, we all rush into the next room before they can reset.  And there [G] we are attacked by 5 ghouls and a ghast.  They don't last long -- Becky cleaves three of them -- but after killing one Tarva loses her grip on Heart's Reach and seemingly tosses him away (blush).  After they're all down, and while Tarva is finding HR, Gerold and Mia notice a door in one corner of the room.  It leads into another room where the ghouls and ghast had been reciding, but there's nothing there.  After Tarva uses a wand of Cure Light to bring everyone back up to full health, we go up the stairs and, finally, out of the water.

Around the corner we find a door blocking the way.  It isn't trapped or locked, but the wood has swollen to where it is hard to open.  However, Becky, with an assist from Tarva, does open it.  As soon as the door is open, we all hear the second-most [*] beautiful singing we've ever heard.  Mia, Gerold, and Tarva all save, but Becky is entranced and compelled to move forward in the new room [H].  But then Tarva begins singing Countersong and brings Becky out of her compulsion.  We cannot see anything that would be creating the enchanting song.  Mia checks for traps and finds that Becky was about to compulsively walk into a room-wide pit trap [I].  Tarva  keeps the Countersong up, and works into its lyrics a suggestion to toss a light further down the room.  Becky takes off her sunstone necklace and tosses it far enough to show the end of the room - empty, and we didn't see anything during the stone's flight to where it landed and then skidded a few feet.  Gerold uses Mage Hand  to move his sunstone to a spot halfway between us and Becky's sunstone - now the entire room is lit but we still don't see anyone.  Mia works on disabling the pit trap, and succeeds.  Becky goes across first, and just beyond the other edge of the trap slips and falls down [J].  Tarva (still singing, as is the foe) walks up to the edge of the pit cover, feels with one foot how slippery the next floor is, tries to walk on it anyway, but also slips and falls.  Mia thinks hmmm, and pulls out a four pound bag of  coffee, which she starts sprinkling it on the slippery floor [K].  Before she can get very far, the other singing stops (Tarva does not stop) and out of nowhere a harpy flies to attack Gerald.  It misses, and he uses a Magic Missile wand to strike it.  Tarva puts a few arrows into it as it takes a strafing run on her but misses again.  And as it is banking for another attack, Gerald hits it with a Fireball and burns it to a crisp.  Becky thinks Mia is wasting good coffee, and we should just slide across the greasy floor.  She wiggles back to the non-greasy surface, lets Tarva talk her into leaving her four pounds of coffee behind, and takes a running start to skid across all the greasy floor, and right into the other pit trap [L], where she falls on many sharp blades.  There's not much we can do for her from back here, so Mia continues to spread coffee, which makes it possible, if difficult, to stay on our feet.  Closer to the second pit, Mia disbelieves in the end wall of the room, and the wall disappears to reveal that the room goes on another 10' [M] - the harpy had been hiding behind that illusion.  Gerold uses Mage Hand again, this time to move Mia's grappling hook onto the ring on the far door.  She then tosses the loose end of the rope (other end attached to the grappling hook) into the pit, so Becky can use it to jump out.  Becky then threads the rope through the door's ring, and tosses one end back to Mia, so she can help Mia to jump over the pit.  Once on the other side Mia is able to first reset the trap, so the false floor comes back up, and then disable it.  Gerold and Tarva then walk across it, but only after falling down on the last 5' of slippery floor.  Tarva treats Becky's wounds.  We find a scroll with divine spells: Cure Serious and Water Breathing.  

[*] egotistical plug on Tarva's part ;-)

Through the door, and after a dogleg left we come to another door, which Becky easily pushes open.  This room [N] has an oddity: a stream running through it suspended about 2' above the floor.  Items dropped into the top of the stream will either move with the current if they float, or fall through to the floor if they don't.  A careful search reveals no other ways into or out of this room; but there are a number of  wooden boards, each about the right size to be an "individual raft".  We decide that this will be the only way we can go forward. Before we put rafts and ourselves into the stream, Tarva casts Message so that we can communicate (well the others can talk to Tarva, and she can talk to them) so long as we are not far separated.  Our rafting order is: Becky, Tarva, Gerald, Mia.

The only challenge on the rafts is to not fall off, and we all avoid that embarrassment.  When we finally see light ahead, we are coming up on room [O] from the east.  Just as her raft floats into the room, she and her raft are caught in a net and hauled off to the side by two humans.  Surprised, she doesn't have time to warn anyone, and Tarva plus raft are caught in a second net and pulled onto the opposite side of the stream by two more humans.  A third pair position themselves on either side of the opening with spears.  Tarva, howver, is able to use Message to warn Gerold and Mia.  Gerold calmly avoids the spears and floats on down the stream before jumping off on the side furthest from the humans.  Mia uses her warning to jump off her raft and dash past the spearman trying to hit her.  Meanwhile Becky has burst through her net and takes out two humans before turning to the leader.  Whom Becky actually recognizes as being Sir Bluto sans Piate, a nobleman with a price on his head - which Becky decides to collect.  Tarva uses her Escape Artist skill to get out of the net, stands up, draws HR, and immediately loses him.  HR flies a few feet into the stream, and then drops through to the floor.  Becky kills the remaining humans on her side of the stream, decaptiating Sir Bluto (why take back anything more than his head?).  Tarva tumbles away from the humans around her and retrieves HR.  With all the good guys away from the remaining three humans, Gerold casts a Fireball on them and kills all three.

On Sir Bluto we find:
longsword
full plate armor (magic)  -->  put in bag of holding
steel shield
leather boots (magic)  --> put in bag of holding
key  -->  carried by Becky
117gp  -->  carried by Becky
head (one)  -->  carried by Becky

On the minions we find:
nice studded leather (three)  (other three burnt up)
net (one)  (other one burst asunder)
long spears (four)  -->  two put in Mia's Quiver of Ehlonna; two put in Tarva's
rapiers (six)  -->  put in bag of holding
300gp  -->  carried by Becky

While we're searching bodies, Mia's "raft", which had floated out of this room, floats back in again from the direction we'd come from.  We take this as evidence that the stream runs in a loop, so we can anticipate getting back by rafting forward to the first room.

Searching finds a secret door in the southwest corner; locked.  Becky's key opens the door.  We go down (south, with a dogleg) a pair of long corridors, with nothing more exciting than another door for Becky to push open.  Then we come out on top of an inverted pyramid.  We are on a 10' wide balcony [P] which runs completely around this room.  10' down is a second balcony [Q], also running all around the room, with a transparent wall and ceiling.  The ceiling is at the same level as the balcony we are standing on.  This second balcony is completely filled with water, and inhabited by creatures that one of our group recognizes as being hammerclaws -- sort of huge lobsters which also have a sonic attack.  Inside that and 10' further down is a third balcony [R], also completely fronted and covered with a transparent wall and ceiling.  Its interior is a desert, and there are monsterous scorpions wandering along it.  And inside that and another 10' further down is a fourth balcony [S], completely filled with water and inhabited by seacats.  Finally, the ground floor [T] was 10' further down, had normal walls (including a door to the south), but another transparent ceiling.  Its interior was rather savannah like, and there are three manticores in it.  In a near corner, between Q and R, and again between S and T, there are "shutes" which do not allow water to leave those levels, but -- we somehow know -- will allow people to pass in one direction: down.  In a far corner there are also "shutes" between our level (P) and Q, and between R and S.

We're obviously intended to fight our way along each balcony to the next shute, including the underwater levels.  But Tarva doesn't think that's a good idea.  She mentions wishing that she had Taizu along, with his Shatter spell, and Gerald says that he has it.  Using his familiar bat Vlad to deliver the spell to the center of T's ceiling, he succeeds in knocking a small divot out of the covering.  Becky says, "oh, well, if that's all it takes," and jumps down from ceiling to ceiling and starts pounding away on T's ceiling.  When she is almost all the way through, and the others have joined her, Tarva casts Aid on everyone.  A final blow knocks a hole in the ceiling barely large enough for a person to spend an entire round fitting themselves into to drop down.  Before anyone can do that, the manticores start shooting barbs from their tails up into the group.  Tarva and Mia are shooting arrows at manticores; Gordan casts Fireball on them, doing lots of damage.  Becky drops down, takes some damage, and then starts killing manticores -- most noticeably using an AoO to kill one that was trying to jump up, thrust its tail through the hole, and really blast barbs into Mia and Gordan.  Gordan casts Magic Missiles, and shortly all three are dead.  

Tarva uses her wand to bring everyone up to full health again.  Then Mia checks the door and we open it into a corridor which runs south under the balconies, and is slighlty filled with mist.  At the other end is another door, not trapped but locked.  Mia picks it, then stands back for Tarva to open it.  The room inside [U] has its own light source, 15' vaulted ceilings, rugs, cushions, a 12' long divan, a 6' tall hookah, and a Halfling.  Tarva chats with him, and he says his name is Fenseq; that he is from Greyhawk; that he was imprisoned here by Keraptas; that he doesn't really know why; that he doesn't know how long he's been imprisoned here; and that he really, reallly wants to go home - can we take him out of here?  (Tarva notices the vagueness of some of the answers, plus the long divan and tall hookah, and thinks, "this is not really a Halfling" -- but she is looking for a non-violent, non-confrontational encounter, so doesn't challenge any of that.  Offers Fenseq a rapier, and asks - fully expecting to be turned down - if he'd like a set of full plate mail?  And indeed he is not interested in that; but the rapier is gratefully accepted.  Meanwhile the others in the party are checking the room for secret doors, hidden compartments, and generally randsacking the contents ("how rude" mutters Fenseq).  There is a greatsword over the doorway which Becky considers, but then decides is no better than the one she already has. They find a lovely mahogany box under the divan, which Mia says is not trapped.  Or locked.  When opened, it has a fabulous looking great sword in a black sheath. Tarva backs up so as to be standing in the doorway, thinking to protect against various things-going-wrong possibilities triggered by the box being opened.  We're pretty sure this is Black Razor, one of the three artifacts that another group was tasked with finding and returning.  Tarva, Mia, and (reluctantly) Gerald all vote "NO" when Becky wants to take Black Razor up and wield him.  

We tell Fenseq that we'll take him out of here, and begin to retrace our path.  This involves helping each other up 10' "steps" as we climb up the balconies; explaining the elevated stream and rafting to Fenseq.  The pit traps in the harpy room have not reset themselves.  Mia and Fenseq manage to balance their way across the 5' of slippery floor to the coffee trail; Becky jubilantly slides across - this time with no falling into pits.  Gerald does to.  Tarva fetches a raft from the stream room and rides that across the greasy floor like a sled.  When we go down the stairs to the lower level, we tell Fenseq that there is nothing we can do about the 2' deep water.  Fenseq considers it and then starts walking along the wall instead of the floor.  At the copper squares, Mia determines that they have reset themselves, and she disables them again, taking some more burn damage in the process - which Tarva heals.  At the water pit, Fenseq is still wall-walking, and the rest of us jump; with a rope tied to Gerald so we can - as we need to - pull him back out when he falls in.  The Symbol is still not active.  And the gynosphinx greets us without challenge when we say we're going back outside.

But we forgot about the Stun Symbol, and Becky drops her great ax when it affects her.  Tarva fishes it out of the water and hands it back to her when she comes to.  Then we climb the steps and Fenseq wanders off on his own -- morphing from a Halfling into a 10' Ogre Mage, who waves gleefully at us before disappearing over a hill.  (Somehow we know that he was supposed to be guarding Black Razor for Keraptas, but he was so incensed at the inprisonment that he found a loophole in the command and let us take it without interfering.)


We hole up for the night in order to regain spells.  Also, Tarva burns a white pearl to try Identify on the great sword -- only to discover that it is too powerful an artifact for Identify to work on it.  Tarva tries asking HR if there's some sort of sword-language that he would share with Black Razor.  Not really, but he does get some impressions he can share with Tarva.  Tarva also uses Bardic Knowledge to see what she knows about Keraptas, Black Razor, Whelm, and Wave.

Keraptas -- legondary wizard, appearing periodically over at least 1,300 years.  Not known for being particularly good.  Is thought to be the person who stold the three artifacts we're helping to restore.

Black Razor  --  "Sword of Souls" (says HR) it becomes more aware as its wielder grows more powerful - otherwise it is just a very good greatsword.Tarva remembers that it is made of some unknown material; last known to have been used about 1,000 years ago; few known or legondary appearances before then; thought to have as abilities: Communicate; Protect Mind; Defeat Life; Swallow Souls; and it is not known for being particularly Evil or Good.

Wheln  --  warhammer; not know for having a preferred orientation; of an unknown creation; used against Giants and is a Giant Bane (kills with single blow); was last heard of being used by a Dwarf named Ctenmnir to defend a dwarven commmunity against an attack by Giants - after the community was safe, Ctenmnir took it and went adventuring, nothing further has been heard about it or him.

Wave  --  a trident; typically wielded by druids and clerics devoted to sea deities; no history of being used for Evil, but also none of it championing Good; intelligent weapon; can communicate with and sometimes control residents of the ocean.


Adventure B: Whelm

Back down the spiral staircase. On our way towards the gynosphinx Mia fails to deactivate the Stun Symbol and is herself stunned.  At the gynosphinx we are welcomed back and asked which direction we want to go this time.  We pick east (right) and the gynosphinx recites the following riddle:

East Passage
Die without me, never thank me
Walk right through me, never feel me
Always watching, never speaking
Always lurking, never seen
What am I?

Tarva thinks this sounds like "Air" (and, to herself, notes an elemental theme to the riddles).  The others agree with her, and we each answer "Air" outloud, after which the gynosphinx tells us to "pass".  

There is a Symbol in the ceiling of this passage [V], but when Becky lifts Mia up to check on it, it is already inactive.

Shortly later Mia, who is in front and checking for traps, spots a Green Slime on the ceiling, obviously waiting for some prey to walk underneath and be dropped upon.  Gerald casts a maximized Fireball on it, and it is gone.  When we turn a slight corner and start going true east, there is a side passage going north, and a few feet later the east passage turns south.  We think we're going to follow the north passage, but first Tarva goes to peek around the southward corner.  She sees steps going up, thus out of the 2' of water, to a door.  Getting out of the water seems like a very good idea, so we go south insted.  This door is also wooden and swolen shut, so Tarva assists while Becky slams it open.  Inside is a 30'x30' room [X] with nine silverish globes hanging from the ceiling by wires.  This looks highly suspicious, and doesn't seem to be leading anywhere, so we decide to go away and ignore it  (unless we hit a dead end).

As soon as we turn into the north passage, Tarva can see steps going up to a door in that direction too.  It's another swolen door which Tarva helps Becky to smash open.  Inside the room [Y] five flesh golums bring themselves to order and in unison recite that "One of us does not fit.  Successfully pick which one that is, and you may pass.  Otherwise we will kill you."  The flesh golums have numbers carved into their chests: "5", "7", "9", "11", and "13".  Without even needing to use her Easy Math, Tarva immediately tells the group that "9" is not just the only non-prime, but is also the only square.  The others agree and we say "nine".  The center ("9") golum steps aside, leaving a passage to the stairs  going up from the north end of the room.  

At the top of the stairs the passage immediately turns to the right, and a few feet down the corridor is blocked by a portcullis [Z].  Mia inspects it and doesn't find any way to raise it.  Brute strength seeming to be called for, Becky and Tarva grab it and start to lift.  Only to have the portcullis turn out to be a mimic.  Tarva is trapped by its sticky goo and cannot do anything; Becky however manages to break free.  Annoyed by this, the mimic tries to slam Becky, but misses.  Everyone, except Tarva, then get busy and quickly kill it.  A few rounds later the sticky goo turns to dry powder and Tarva can dust if off her gloves.

We turn south and come to another door which Becky bashes, putting us on a ledge over a huge fiery pit [§] about 60-70 feet across.  The corridor continues on the other side -- or at least there is another landing and another door.  Between the two landings are nine 4' diameter disks, held from the ceiling by chains.  In the pit are two geysers, throwing boiling water and hot mud up to the ceiling and splashing down on the disks.  One of the geysers is erupting ever five rounds and affecting the first through fifth disks, but mostly the third.  The other geyser is erupting every three rounds and affecting the fifth through nineth disks, but mostly the seventh.  Getting across via the disks will require successive jumps.  There is no way to avoid being afflicted by the geysers, but some timing of their eruptions leads to a method which will minimize the damage.  The only problem: while Mia, Becky, and Tarva all have good jumping skills, Gerold doesn't.  Tarva proposes that she sing Inspire Competence to Gerold, which will make his jumping ability good enough to succeed at this crossing.  Tarva will need to stay near Gerold, so she's going to be one disk behind him, which will result in more damage to her, but nothing she can't handle.  But Gerold casts Protection from Elements: Fire on Tarva, so that, over the next two hours, the first 144 points of fire damage are simply ignored.  During the crossing the spell on Tarva absorbs 35 points (and has 109 left).  On the landing, Tarva uses her wand to heal everyone else up to full.

By the time Tarva has cast her (wand's) cure spells, Becky has dealt with the door (pulling it open).  We go down  a short passageway  to an open room [£] with a dry & dusty flagstone floor, which is murky and darkish and resists being lit up by the sunstones.  Some of us sorta see a gas rising along the back wall of the room.  Tarva steps into the center of the room.  Appearing (?forming?) out of the murkiness, a pale dwarf with full plate mail and a warhammer attacks her.  Tarva gets in one good hit (which doesn't bother him as much as it should) while telling him, in Dwarvish that there isn't any need to fight and we could cooperate and leave together.  He replies that Keraptas wouldn't want us here, so that's all the reason to fight he needs.  And hits her back quite strongly.  Becky moves up to hit him, Mia shoots him with her bow; and Gerald is using his Magic Missile wand.  Tarva takes a short step to flank with Becky, but decides he is too powerful for her to just trade blows with and starts fighting defensively, meanwhile taunting him to keep his attention on her ("you should become a carpenter: your hammer could probably hit nails"), while the others whittle him down.  Suddenly he vanishes into a gas - armor, hammer, and all - and is gone.  "Vampire," Mia mutters.  

Searching the room (it is still murky and hard to see in), Becky finds a pile of rocks [¢] along the back wall.  Moving them aside she uncovers what looks like a coffin; and when we open it there is the body of a dwarf inside - looking amazingly (or not;-) similar to the dwarf we'd just been fighting.  Tarva casts Detect Evil, and yes: it is quite strong.  Becky pulls the body out and beheads it.  We then strip the body, and the coffin, dump the body and head back in, and burn (thank you, Gerald) the coffin down to ashes.  Tarva casts Detect Evil again, and this time there is only a faint lingering aura.

We have found:
warhammer (Magic) -- put in bag of holding
plate mail  -- put in bag of holding
a deep green potion
wand  (Magic)  (that night Tarva casts Identify and it is a Cure Light with 22 shots) -- Tarva to carry
scroll  (Magic) arcane: Magic Mouth, Dispel Magic, Summon Monster 3  -- Gerold to carry
book: not magic, written in Dwarvish, it is Ctenmnir's journal; so we guess we now know what happen to him -- and have confirmation that this warhammer is Whelm

We go back out.  Crossing the disks the same way as before and then healing everyone.  The flesh golums do not give us any problems going in this direction.  The Symbol before the gynosphinx is still disabled.  We tell the gynosphinx we're going out, and she lets us pass.  And Mia disables the Stun Symbol between the gynosphinx and the spiral stairs.


Overnight, Tarva casts Identify on:
wand -- (see above)
leather boots --
Sir Bluto's plate mail --
Ctenmnir's plate mail --


Adventure C:  Wave