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Lesson Learned
Last night's D&D session was interesting.
Lately we've been probing an enormous complex of tunnels populated by evil giant (human-sized) ants and evil wizards, all servants of the King. We're really too few to be doing this on our own, so we requested the help of the Queen Mother ant, who's an ally of our boss. She's sending one of her daughters to start up a rival colony in the same complex, which is empty at that end.
In the meantime, we decided to raise a ruckus among the bad ants. :D
Since it's dark in the tunnels and there are miles and miles of them, we mostly travel using in mist form (using the Wind Walk spell, which allows very high-speed travel), and use Darkvision spells to see.
We went down a tunnel that we'd had some battles in before. After a while, though, we ran into a sheer stone wall; it hadn't been there before. Fortunately in mist form we can squeeze through tiny holes, so Spike, the lead fighter, solidified and dug a quick hole through the dirt at the edge of the stone wall (which had obviously been created by magic).
We all flowed through the hole and continued down the tunnel. But we very quickly ran into a second wall, very much like the first. Spike solidified again, and-
Quick explanation about Wind Walk: the spell lasts about 12 hours. During that time you can shift back and forth at will between mist form and your normal solid state. But it take five full rounds to change from one form to the other, and during that transition time, you're effectively helpless.
In mist form it's almost impossible to make any sort of magical attack, and physical attacks are completely impossible. You can still be attacked, but have a high resistance to damage. Unfortunately it's impossible to be healed in mist form.
So Spike started to turn solid. Several of us were going to turn solid along with him, but he signalled us to stay in mist form. Which was a huge mistake, because the moment he turned solid a giant-sized monster surged up out of the ground beneath him and bit him nearly in half. He didn't die, but one more attack like that would kill him.
And the rest of us were stuck in mist form; it would take five combat rounds for us to get solid. And it was a certainty that the creature would have killed Spike long before then.
That was the lesson we learned that evening, by the way: never to let only one person at a time be solid while the rest of us were in mist form.
What could we do? We started solidifying. Spike took a couple of savage clawings, putting him within a few hit points of death. And then he did something he'd never done before: he faked his own death. Fell back and bled freely. Fortunately the creature bought his act (which was pretty convincing, since Spike was practically dead anyway).
Unfortunately the creature decided to turn its attention to the rest of us; we were still misty as we transformed, but it could hurt us.
And it did. It tore one of the group nearly to pieces. He survived, but only just. Then the creature ignored him (he was obviously not a threat in mist form), and came after me.
It did a lot of damage to me, but we all finally solidified before it could quite finish killing me. Fortunately one of the group had a Heal spell ready, so within moments I was fully healed and ready to fight. And Spike, who had swallowed a healing potion and been hit with an additional long-range healing spell, came back to the battle as well.
What happened next was embarrassing. We all missed. Three times in a row I rolled four or less on a d20. The creature slashed Spike back down to death's door (he immediately played dead again, successfully), and then turned back to me.
And for a SECOND time I missed - four attacks, this time (we'd all been hit with a Haste spell while the creature was attacking Spike)! I was rolling awfully poorly.
So poorly, in fact, that the creature decided that I wasn't a threat and walked past me to kill the spellcasters. That was a mistake, because I was able to get an attack of opportunity and actually hit for some solid damage.
Nonetheless, it did some serious harm to one of the spellcasters, who used a Dimension Door spell to pull himself and his fellow mage to the opposite side of the tunnel, just behind Spike. That left me facing the creature (which we now knew was an atypical Xorn) all alone.
But the next round my luck suddenly changed. I hit not once, not twice, but FOUR times - and the fourth hit was a critical! The combined damage killed the creature outright.
I pulled a tooth out of its head as a trophy, and we got out of the tunnels as quickly as we could.
And that was the session.
Lately we've been probing an enormous complex of tunnels populated by evil giant (human-sized) ants and evil wizards, all servants of the King. We're really too few to be doing this on our own, so we requested the help of the Queen Mother ant, who's an ally of our boss. She's sending one of her daughters to start up a rival colony in the same complex, which is empty at that end.
In the meantime, we decided to raise a ruckus among the bad ants. :D
Since it's dark in the tunnels and there are miles and miles of them, we mostly travel using in mist form (using the Wind Walk spell, which allows very high-speed travel), and use Darkvision spells to see.
We went down a tunnel that we'd had some battles in before. After a while, though, we ran into a sheer stone wall; it hadn't been there before. Fortunately in mist form we can squeeze through tiny holes, so Spike, the lead fighter, solidified and dug a quick hole through the dirt at the edge of the stone wall (which had obviously been created by magic).
We all flowed through the hole and continued down the tunnel. But we very quickly ran into a second wall, very much like the first. Spike solidified again, and-
Quick explanation about Wind Walk: the spell lasts about 12 hours. During that time you can shift back and forth at will between mist form and your normal solid state. But it take five full rounds to change from one form to the other, and during that transition time, you're effectively helpless.
In mist form it's almost impossible to make any sort of magical attack, and physical attacks are completely impossible. You can still be attacked, but have a high resistance to damage. Unfortunately it's impossible to be healed in mist form.
So Spike started to turn solid. Several of us were going to turn solid along with him, but he signalled us to stay in mist form. Which was a huge mistake, because the moment he turned solid a giant-sized monster surged up out of the ground beneath him and bit him nearly in half. He didn't die, but one more attack like that would kill him.
And the rest of us were stuck in mist form; it would take five combat rounds for us to get solid. And it was a certainty that the creature would have killed Spike long before then.
That was the lesson we learned that evening, by the way: never to let only one person at a time be solid while the rest of us were in mist form.
What could we do? We started solidifying. Spike took a couple of savage clawings, putting him within a few hit points of death. And then he did something he'd never done before: he faked his own death. Fell back and bled freely. Fortunately the creature bought his act (which was pretty convincing, since Spike was practically dead anyway).
Unfortunately the creature decided to turn its attention to the rest of us; we were still misty as we transformed, but it could hurt us.
And it did. It tore one of the group nearly to pieces. He survived, but only just. Then the creature ignored him (he was obviously not a threat in mist form), and came after me.
It did a lot of damage to me, but we all finally solidified before it could quite finish killing me. Fortunately one of the group had a Heal spell ready, so within moments I was fully healed and ready to fight. And Spike, who had swallowed a healing potion and been hit with an additional long-range healing spell, came back to the battle as well.
What happened next was embarrassing. We all missed. Three times in a row I rolled four or less on a d20. The creature slashed Spike back down to death's door (he immediately played dead again, successfully), and then turned back to me.
And for a SECOND time I missed - four attacks, this time (we'd all been hit with a Haste spell while the creature was attacking Spike)! I was rolling awfully poorly.
So poorly, in fact, that the creature decided that I wasn't a threat and walked past me to kill the spellcasters. That was a mistake, because I was able to get an attack of opportunity and actually hit for some solid damage.
Nonetheless, it did some serious harm to one of the spellcasters, who used a Dimension Door spell to pull himself and his fellow mage to the opposite side of the tunnel, just behind Spike. That left me facing the creature (which we now knew was an atypical Xorn) all alone.
But the next round my luck suddenly changed. I hit not once, not twice, but FOUR times - and the fourth hit was a critical! The combined damage killed the creature outright.
I pulled a tooth out of its head as a trophy, and we got out of the tunnels as quickly as we could.
And that was the session.