RC: No. America Tue/Sun - The Ruins of Ascore

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Ah, to be able to make a trap with these..." Xalen said as he looked over the tanglefoot bags, alchimists fire, and thunderstones. "Tis a question best left to our rougish harper to answer. However, even if we *can* set a sucessful trap for the drow, they have the entire city of Menzobarenzzan waiting in the wings. No...if we are to do any good here, we must come up with some way to stop the Shade Lords from channeling the power of the vergence, not stop a few drow in the undercircle" Xalen scoffs and walks to the back wall of the room, deep in though. Suddenly, he turns and adress the rest. "Though....perhaps these drow do have some use in this attempt to tap the vergence of it's power. They do seem to be at some place called the undercircle; perahps the shade lords do need them for more than driving through the undersurface of Faerun and destroying all in their wake. Yes...perhaps.....perhaps a trap for them would prove useful in postponing the shadelords plans. Ah..blast, but this is all so iffy when we don't know exaclty what the plans are and what roles everyone plays. All we may be doing is wasting our time. There seem to be so many avenues to take and so little time. Perhaps if we could find out what it would take to harness the power here. Could we look in the Temple Complex perhaps, or even Sorcery Hall for the answers we seem to need?"

 

"Let's not be too hasty to move on now...," Pimm says to Xalen, "don't forget that if we should succeed in interfering with the Shades, this may be our escape route. I'd certainly rather ambush a group of unprepared dark elves, than run headlong into them later while we are unready and they are."

"The only drawback to an ambush I can think of, off hand, is that our presence is evident by the trap Phineous took care of over there, however even if we are detected, it doesn't make them any more armed... well," Pimm chuckles, "hopefully."

 

"The shades... the shades... Serena has told us that we are to be afraid of somebody called Gromph Baenre. That dark elf, while being the archmage of Menzoberranzan, is a drow male, and has chosen a profession in no particular favour of Lloth. I have studied the tomes of and about dark elves and, although cannot be sure, I can say that that particular Baenre would not have the city of Menzoberranzan helping him. It seems more likely that all of his, so to say, competitors for the rather prestigeous title would wait for him to make the tiniest mistake and then put the fabled adamantite bolt through his skull..."
Pheldas took a moment to collect his thoughts.
"I'm in no way saying that the Menzoberranzan's archmage is no threat, but if he runs that show, we better take care of his subordinates before we proceed to the shades. And these, so it would seem, are the drow that store their wares here. Now, let us think of our ways quickly..."

 

"Fine, fine. If all of you insist on ambushing a group of Drow, I'll help. But I truly think at some point we should check some of these places and see what we can find on exacly how one goes about harnessing the power of this Vergence. Otherwise we will simply continue stumbling blindly in the dark until it may be to late to do anything about out problem."

"Now, as far as this drow trap goes....if we do set up a trap, how will we have any idea they will even come back up here any time soon. I would think if we were to set a trap, there would need to be some sort of bait so to speak to lead them here into our ambush."

[This message has been edited by Crawl (edited October 29, 2001).]

 

After a brief discussion, it was decided that Phineous would explore the passage down, with Pimm and Talia trailing behind about 50 feet or so. When Phineous came to a split in the passage, the three returned. So as to avoid being ambushed, the entire party traveled to the intersection, and continued on toward the south east. That passage turned south, and then back east. At this point, Phineous stopped and was beginning to explain that the passage was heading back east, when Pheldas spotted a shadowy figure about to strike Phineous. Just as Phineous turned, the Drow thrust out with a dagger, missing Phineous. The Drow then cast Darkness, and the party retreated back to the sewers of Ascore.

There they set up a wall using the crates from the room, and waited. They placed flasks of alchemist’s fire, thunderstones, and tanglefoot bags where all could reach them. Pimm, and Pheldas were the first to notice a faint shimmering in the doorway of the room leading to the cavern passage. Deducing that it must be drow, Pheldas fired a crossbow bolt at the doorway. The bolt soared into the room striking the wall. Phineous threw a tanglefoot bag while Pimm and Talia launched sling bullets. Talia scored a critical on the drow with one of her new sling bullets, and the drow slumped to the floor. Phineous then grabbed a flask of alchemist’s fire and threw it toward the back corner of the room near the passage, exposing himself, but striking an invisible drow, and engulfing it and another drow in the passage in flames. Talia and Pimm hit the entangled drow with Fire Burst Sling Bullets, killing him, while Pheldas and Xalen missed the flaming one with their shots. Three more drow appeared in the room, firing hand cross bows at Phineous, who had exposed himself throwing the flask toward the rear of the room. Two of the bolts hit, and Phineous fell to the poison, unconscious. Talia and Pheldas missed with their next attacks, and Pimm cast sanctuary on himself, and began to move toward the fallen halfling. Xalen threw a Thunderstone, striking the floor at the feet of the drow in the middle. The three Drow grasped their ears as the thundering explosion deafened them. Calin threw a flask of Alchemists fire, striking the last one in line and he was engulfed in flame. The lead drow, being deafened and not able to effectively cast a spell, drew his rapier and charged at Talia, while the middle one fired at Pheldas, both were missed by the attacks. Talia ran the Drow attacking her through with her new scimitar, and Xalen dropped the last one with an arrow. The odor of burnt Drow filled the air, as the group recovered from the attack. Pimm was able to determine that Phineous was alive, but was not able to revive him.

A quick search of the bodies yielded six belt pouches, three of which were burned, two scroll cases - one made of bone and seemingly fire proof, four rapiers, three hand crossbows, and a dagger. Pimm kept the bone scroll case, while Talia gave the other one to Pheldas. One of the pouches contained three gems, one held three small bags of glittering dust, and the other four held 7 Platinum coins each. The party decided to move from this area, traveling back down the passage, Calin carrying Phineous. This time they moved off to the north west, and after traveling about 200 feet, they came to a cavern roughly circular, and 200 feet in diameter. Thrusting down from the ceiling of the cavern, were 13 Ruby Pillars, 12 in a circle 100 feet across and one in the center. The 12 outlying pillars each had 20 engraved into them in a silvery substance. Talia noticed a secret door in the southeast section of the chamber.

Each party member receives 400 experience points.

 

After handing him the Scrolls she addresses the mage "Could you look at these and see if you can decipher what they are? oh.. and Perhaps you should scribe the engravings while we have a moment to spare, if they are not the same as above ofcourse."

After giving the mage the scrolls, Talia walks towards the door to more closely inspect it, looking for any means with which to open it.



[This message has been edited by Xenecor (edited October 31, 2001).]

 

"Scrolls? Aye, of course, let me take a look..." Pheldas takes the case,
"As for the engravings - if we are to succeed in our quest, I will have more time to study the place... If we succeed..."

 

OK, just to clarify this, the following is the experience totals I have for each character. If you have a different amount, let me know what it is. I wnet through all the threads to get these figures.

Pimm - 4830
Xalen - 3505
Pheldas - 3760
Talia - 3410
Calin - 3610

 

After some time studying the scrolls, Pheldas declared that these were the scrolls of Gaseous Form, Locate Object, Flaming Sphere and Non-Detection. The mage explained the effect of each spell in a score of words, and deepened attention is his spellbook.

[This message has been edited by Skedaddle (edited November 04, 2001).]