After tricking a living statue into falling down a pit our intrepid warriors continue on in hopes of a big pay day!
A simple T-Junction leads out from the snowy field with only one icy room behind it.
In spite of allegedly being able to read we had forgotten that the only monster's we were supposed to not encounter would be ogres per the adventure rules, oops! This must just be the mastermind behind the fall of the paymaster's lair, that's it for sure! The Room contained an ogre bull and his gnoblar friends.
The outlaw heroically leapt into the fray hoping to cleave through the gnoblar's however he only manages to hit one and stand there like a fool.
This results in learning a lesson about the gang up rules and just how much they hurt! Don't worry he got better...
It takes a few turns to whittle down the ogre and even the brewmaster goes to zero wounds at one point but eventually the task is done and our first ogre is taken out of the picture! For our troubles we gain a Blood Chalice which can be used as a power source however for each point of power taken from the chalice the spellcaster loses one permanent wound until the end of the adventure.
After much debate it was later decided to sell the accursed artefact.
Heading back to the snowy fields door number two contained another T-Junction with just one room leading off of it.
This dead end just happened to have yet more evil artwork in the form of a Darkness Statue. We quickly decided not to mess with that room however...
The dungeon was happy to mess with us as we rolled an unexpected event watching four nurglings sneak up behind us as we ponder the paymaster's art collection. Being armed with magical weapons we made short work of the tiny sacks of poo
As a reward we find 10 Throwing Daggers of the Eagle, a Tzeentchian item that for each dagger that hits a monster takes damage in the power phase equal to the power roll with no modifiers. A perfect collection of daggers for the Outlaw to use later.
With no other options remaining we were left to cross the frozen river in search of the objective room and an exit.
The outlaw still had his luck point so after handing one end of the rope to the dwarf and tethering the other to himself he made the leap to the first ice block easily while the Shaman created more floating platforms to easily make it across. On the other side the rope was tied to make a makeshift bridge line and make it easy for the rest of the party to get across.
We now had no rope however so any pitfalls would be instant death!
Opening the next door we encountered a perfect Easter surprise as a rolling boulder trap was released with everyone on a precarious icy ledge lined up for a perfect strike!
Only the swashbuckler managed to somehow dodge the boulder with everyone else taking damage. At this point we begin to ponder why the paymaster never bothered to warn us about the plethora of traps that he had left in his lair to maim, crush and smash our poor party.
The giant egg smashed into the far wall revealing another room but we soldier on laser focused on our real goal, the paymaster's chest!
Beyond the boulder trap we find the objective room! It's time to pray to the dice gods of old that our streak of terrible luck is finally over.
We roll three rolls of equal level monsters (not at all that bad!) first up is a wolf. Being cavalry it has to start out of line of sight which just so happens to force it to make a leap over the river. The poor dogo promptly fails this roll and falls right in (falling monsters really is the theme of this dungeon)
This left us to deal with 3 beastmen, 6 ungor and 6 harpies! The ungor with their skirmish rules still setup in close combat with a few out of range to use bows for now, they will also have the threat of reinforcing bringing their numbers back unless we can quickly dispatch them.
The harpies are yet another layer of danger as they have the harass rule meaning they will stay two squares away and attack with their reach 2 ability, quite annoying!
The brewmaster downs some of his best ale and powers up like a drunken Popeye, deathblowing his way through the ungor with his goblin poker spear. The harpies aren't the only ones with a reach weapon!
As the outlaw continues to fail to hit and finish off a beastman at one wound the harpies attack back downing all but the kislevite who is left to heal the party! Needless to say we are running low on healing potions at this point.
The theme of missing attacks breaks after a few rounds but the jumping jacks of going to zero wounds does not! We ask only for a chance to hit and smite our most hated foes who poke and jab us to the death!
The brewmaster again responds smacking the harpies out of the sky along with a shot from the swashbuckler!
With only one beastmen left we quickly acquire the paymaster's chest after a long hard fought battle. It is time to finally find a way out of this Gygaxian nightmare of a dungeon.
Sure enough the next room is the chamber of mists which leads to the final card, the spiral staircase (our only exit!).
again a horrible piece of evil artwork has been left here but we have no choice, we must test the merit of it's artistic worth!
Nine ghouls leap from the shadows to convince us that the wizardly statue is beyond our understanding both aesthetically and artistically. It doesn't take long for us to tell them how uninterested we are in purchasing their statue and we finally clear a path to the exit!
On the way back home we encounter another blizzard and a sacred grove for the Kislev Shaman to train up to level 2!
Back at the city we cash in our paychest by giving it back and taking the objective room treasures. The outlaw gets the Etherion quiver, not having a bow he sells this. The Swashbuckler gets a Daemon Frost Bite Revolver which deals chill damage, lowers enemy movement and drops their to hit value by one for each hit!
The Brewmaster scores the Dolorous Blade of Bretonnia somehow boosting his killing power by a metric ton! Finally t he Kislev Shaman finds a Brooch of power to store some excess power. Overall a very big pay day indeed.
Everyone levels up now gaining new skills and stats (soon we will even name them so we can get attached when they die). The Outlaw is quickly challenged to a dual and skips town, the Shaman finds an epic quest (more on that next time) and gets swindled in the tavern and we stock up on a few supplies (including new rope!).
Join us next time as we take on a very special tribe of marauders.
