The Pool of Elements
Part 1: Bathing
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In Game |
Out of Character |
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A Change of Scenery When the party reaches the As they near the top, the elemental chaos roils and thunders, dropping out strange creatures never seen before in this world. Each one is a combination of two elements, similar to a para-elemental, but with each facet of its being distinct rather than merged. The first to come are two large somewhat humanoid elementals made of fire and stone. The rockfire dreadnoughts fall from the pool, unable to fly, but quickly stand and attack. Their flailing fists miss Naxis and Arik, but the heat that surrounds them still burns the swordmage. Arik would have been caught too, but he used the opportunity given by their fall to slip out of the heat. Next a swirling vortex and stone and wind flies out and hovers just outside the range of the group’s melee combatants. The earthwind ravager sends out a small piece of itself, and a tiny vortex lifts Adran off the ground, stopping him from moving while the rocks inside it pelt the priest. Arik steps up to the flaming creatures before him and takes a mighty swing. It misses, but the primal nature within it is still effective. His fury grows along with a thick mat of fur, and all thought of injury flees from his brain. Mist and fog pour out of the pool, forming into a huge cyclone of chaotic fury. The thunderblast cyclone fills the air with charged mist, part of which comes from itself, then sends electricity coursing through the vapors and into both friend and foe. Literally hot on its heels is a trio of fiery whirlwinds. They rush to and fro through the battlefield, burning all they touch, and then lash out at the priest with the fiery whips they have where arms might be. Surrounded and oppressed, Adran calls down a calming light, enthralling one of the firelasher lords. He uses his oracular skills to try to make it stick on more of the elementals, but the visions he gets are filled with purple light and pulsating flesh and he reels from them. Seeing how resilient the creatures are, the artificer orders his gloves to life, and they begin to enhance his magic, making it like a razor to cut through resistances. He fills the air with lightning, which then coalesces around him. Only one firelasher is injured, but the protection it grants will last for the battle. He then orders the platform to drop, and it begins to float slowly towards the ground, unknowingly saving them from the fifth and final guardian. Naxis grows to giantish proportions, and then unleashes a wave of fire that catches one of the dreadnoughts and two of the lashers. Being partly made of fire, they resist some of it, but not all. The two dreadnoughts slide forward to catch Adran and Artesano in their auras as well, then drive heavy fists of stone into the swordmage. The ravager continues to hold Adran aloft in the whirlwind, and sends a blast of air out at the priest and the artificer, but misses them both. Arik shifts and uses the training he maintained from his years as a fighter to lure the foes in and swing away. He then surges on adrenaline and cuts another arc around himself, but the whirlwind of his blade only hits one of the dreadnoughts, shoving it back and knocking it off of the platform to hurtle to the ground below. The cyclone moves away from the threat, using all of its effort to avoid the barbarian’s polearm. A burst of flame from the lasher lords sends Artesano hurtling over the edge as well, and knocks the cleric over. Naxis responds with a frosty backlash that cuts deep into one of the guardians. Moments later the other lashers move to blast Adran and Arik over the ledge. Adran floats gently to the ground thanks to his ring of feather falling, and Arik lands hard but on his feet. The priest bides his time, readying a burst of healing energy for when Naxis also comes down. Artesano crafts a tiny figurine and imbues it with large amounts of healing energy, taking a bit for himself and hopping to his feet like a trained acrobat. Naxis slides in and unleashes a Shyran Cataclysm of elements, and the fire, frost, thunder, and wind blast one of the lasher lords. He then walks off of the edge, taking a couple of hard dreadnought and lasher hits for his troubles. But as he floats gently to the ground, Adran heals everyone but Arik, who is out of range. The dreadnought still on the platform reaches into his chest and draws forth a ball of magma which he hurls at the healer. The other moves up to punch him as well. The ravager continues to hold the priest in place and pummel him with gravel, but spends most of its effort flying down closer to the fight. Arik stands and charges the dreadnought that attacked Adran, sending it bowling over and away from the priest. The lashers fly down and through Arik, Adran, and Artesano setting them all alight. Adran lights a holy torch of his own faith, giving everyone a moment’s rest and wrapping them in fleeting armor of light. Artesano sends a crossbow bolt through one of the lashers, almost completely destroying the energy that holds it together. He misses the other two targets. Naxis’s giant sword crackles with electricity and drives into the heart of the dreadnought Arik just knocked down, and the thing shatters like a miniature volcano top. The earthwind ravager splits his efforts between Arik and Adran, holding the priest up and sending another whirlwind towards the barbarian, who dodges it easily. With most of the enemies flying out of his reach, Arik slides to one of the lashers and cuts out with his glaive, but misses. He then moves to a more advantageous position. The cyclone glides down swiftly and again fills the air with charged mist, zapping both Adran and Artesano. The lashers run through everyone but Naxis, then send gouts of flame all around to knock the three away and to the ground. Adran heals himself while Artesano sends out a magic missile towards the now insubstantial cyclone. It misses despite his temporal sight, but the follow up of a mythal spark slams the cyclone and one of the lashers. Naxis conjures a whip of electricity, wraps it around the earthwind ravager, and drags the thing closer to the ground. The dreadnought still on the platform has dropped almost all of the way to the ground, so it bides its time. The ravager continues to hold the cleric aloft and moves well away from the swordmage before sending another dust devil out to capture the barbarian. Arik stands back up, thinks about drawing a javelin, but decides to wait for one of the creatures to get close to him instead. The cyclone rages above them all and bolts of lightning blast down into the party, coursing through all but Naxis thanks to his Genasi heritage. The lasher lords miss Adran but hit Arik and Naxis. Adran’s lance of faith misses, but Artesano sends another bolt out, this time to burrow into the ravager. The dreadnought charges the cleric with a wild swing that connects, but meets Naxis’s blade for his efforts. The full blade then glows with the chaotic energies of the combined elements, becoming an instrument of death for elementals. Seeing that it is mostly unnecessary, the ravager releases its grip on Adran, but holds onto Arik out of fear for the dragonborn’s glaive. It flies over and unleashes a blast at the cleric and swordmage, but misses them both. Arik stands back up and again waits for someone to come close. The cyclone fills the air with mist again, protecting itself while dealing out a very small amount of pain. The lashers again blast, this time sending Adran close to the healing figurine, and Naxis away from them. The priest uses the opportunity to stand, draw the last of the energy from the artifice, and then prophecy the ravager’s doom. Artesano just barely misses the thunderblast cyclone, and sends more healing poultices towards Adran. The dreadnought pounds on Naxis, who responds by slamming the ravager with a meteor strike. He would have missed but for the pain caused by the crossbow bolt still burrowing it’s way around inside. The secondary blast washes over the lashers. The ravager holds the barbarian in place still and flees from the swordmage, but takes a cut for its troubles. It tries to wrap the swordmage in a dust devil, but the lightly armored and highly nimble Genasi easily sidesteps it. Arik, seeing that nobody is going to get near him on purpose, draws and throws a javelin at the ravager. The cyclone unleashes another burst of lightning, hurting everyone but Artesano, and manages to kill the dreadnought in the process. The lashers hit everyone but Naxis with their fiery blast, sending the group bouncing like bowling pins. Adran hits the ravager with a Hammer of Fate, sending it exploding in all directions, the forces that animated it gone. He then calls upon his channel to the Raven Queen through the Pool of Faith, and is shown another prophecy of the death of a foe. Artesano stands and prepares to blast the cyclone if it gets close, then Naxis grabs the thing with a whip of lightning and drags it into range. The motes flare and Arik charges with a howling strike that sends a lasher into the next life. The cyclone bolts Artesano, who responds with a runic bolt of his own, killing the thing. The others quickly mop up. |
Artesano has Tenser’s Lift, so he creates a 6x6 floating platform for the group to ride up towards the guardians they know await. Arik has a feat that lets him shift after he attacks, which preserves him from the dreadnought’s aura. He has changed by going through the pool of time and is now a glaive-wielding barbarian / iron vanguard built to shove his enemies around. The ravager’s ability to immobilize someone with a sustainable effect was pretty nasty. The cleric is a ranged attacker, so didn’t mind as much as he might’ve, but later it almost completely neutralizes the barbarian for a while. Stone Bear Rage + Primal Vitality for 28 temporary hit points mean he won’t be hurt any time soon. Yet again the Divine Oracle’s ability to roll twice against Will defense turns out to be a two-edged sword, as the cleric dazes himself. The last guardian is a psychic trap with a burst of 5, and he just barely dropped them out of its range. They’ll have to deal with it later, but by itself it’s no threat and so we didn’t bother rolling it out. And that was the end of round 1. Acrobatics lowered the fall damage by 15 for the barbarian. The Healing Figurine holds 94 hit points (the artificer’s surge value). Anyone next to it can use it as a free action. He uses 50 of it for himself. Acrobat Boots (a very low level but useful item) are what allow him to stand as a minor action. A Ring of Flight lets you feather fall. +7 AC from the Holy Torch meant very little damage was going to happen next turn. A crit from skipping shot is followed by two misses. Pressing Strike is nice. It’s a barbarian at will power that lets you shift two, through enemies, before you attack. It also deals a little extra damage if you’re raging, and knocks them back a squares, which means that for Arik it’s two squares, a bunch of damage, and knocked prone. Bane Blade = +2d6 damage versus creatures that share one of the types of the target, in this case Elemental. Yep, that’s it for the ravager. The prophecy doesn’t do any damage, but it’s got a “Free crit” target on it’s head that won’t go away for a while. Naxis’s crits deal 5d10 damage the round after they hit thanks to his weapon, so the ravager would have been dead anyway, but the cleric’s player had no way to know that, so he killed the thing. It was getting close to time for one player to leave, and the battle was all but over, so we called it here. They took a while to make sure everything was in place for their swim through the pool. |
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Bathing In a fairly anticlimactic swim, everyone easily bathes in the Pool of Elements. When they come out, Naxis’s arms are wreathed in flame, and he slips partly into the ground before catching himself. Arik’s arms are also covered in fire, as he floats a few inches above the ground. Adran also dips into the earth below, but when he hops back out he is left to hover. Artesano’s fingers dance with flames and he too burrows subconsciously for a brief second. |
Thanks to preparation and an item the barbarian had for a completely different ability, only the cleric had a slight chance of failure (Iron of Spite deals damage and gives +6 to Arcana, but he just wanted the damage). With his Divine Trickster and Pool of Time rerolls he never did. Because of their lack of failure (a a major success), each PC got to choose two abilities: Earth: Burrow 3 Fire: +2d6 fire damage for one at-will power Air: Fly speed equal to ½ land speed Void (not chosen): +2 when stunting (i.e. using DMG page 42), and +2 when using non-primary skills in a challenge. Water (not chosen): Ignore difficult terrain |
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I Am Your Master Now With a short chat, Adran convinces the talisman of Orcus to follow Artesano, and it disappears into the cosmos to find good lackeys for the Eladrin artificer. It leaves behind a powerful amulet. |
This was a skill challenge,
but the priest couldn’t fail so we didn’t bother rolling it out. After that we
called it a night. We started short one player, and another was about to
leave. |
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Recap Before setting out, they compare notes and review what they know of the pool and the benefits and perils of travelling through it. In their talks with Jarlaxle they learned many things, including why one would want to travel through the pool of elements: doing so attunes oneself to the destination plane, making you immune to the normal ravages of its environment and partially resistant to attacks based on its source. Jarlaxle consulted with oracles via rituals before every
journey. He didn't flee because of the giants on the battlements.
Their longbows were accurate, but not enough to land a solid blow. It was the
recognition of Brimer that sent him scurrying.
Storm giant society is based on strength and honor, so their king has to be
both a badass and very determined when seeking his goals. The honor part
probably meant a bribe was out of the question, and the merc
didn't want to hang around to find out. The mention of a ziggurat in the far realms reminds Adran of the legend of St. Solliers the Twice Martyred’s first death and rebirth. While battling an incursion of the Far Realms into Calimport the paladin dove into a portal in order to seal it from the inside. He must have succeeded, for it did close hours later, but he never emerged from it. When next he was seen he had been transformed into an angel by the Raven Queen. His martyrdom had lost him his holy avenger inside an ancient ziggurat that stands on the border between Here and Not Here, but had earned him eternal honor in his mistress’s name. |
In game terms this
translates to environmental immunity and resistance to attacks with the
appropriate keywords or effects. Water = ½ damage from crushing attacks and
falls and the ability to breathe water. Fire = immunity to normal flam and
heat extremes, and resist fire 10. Earth = immunity to natural earth damage
(such as avalanches), and resist acid 10. Bribery is a social skill challenge with the bribe starting at 60,000gp and each failure upping it (first to 90,000; then to 175,000). Total failure means a fight with the Pasha and his guards. “Not enough
to land a solid blow” is code for “they didn’t roll their damage,” i.e. they
were minions. |