Episode 2.5

Greg, Tony, Brad, Kathy, Ernie

Leaving the sun hole, the party next headed to the area marked as "Rift."

Along the way, the were attacked by three wights. The wights charged at Greg, but were unable to hit him Ernie then used his turning ability and destroyed them.

They found a large sinkhole, about one hundred feet across, with several broken bridges that must have crossed it in a previous time. Ernie cast light on a copper piece and dropped it into the pit. They saw it reach the bottom and determined it was about 500 feet deep. While they were discussing what to do next, several people noticed something large move around down in the pit and the light disappeared. Bats flew up, flittered around and then raced away down the sde tunnels, but nothing attacked the group. There was a ledge that went around the outside of the ledge, but it appeared a bit too treacherous. The party decided to bypass the sink hole, backtrack to a different tunnel and go around it. They ended up finding the sinkhole again, entering the chamber from a different tunnel, but left without incident.

The next place they went was an area labeled "stranglers." When they got there, they noticed some treasure shoved under a ledge in what looked like a bad attempt to hide it. They also noticed a half dozen monkey-sized creatures hiding amongst the stalagtites. The creatures attacked, using very long tentacles to wrap around the character's neck. Tony, Greg and Brad stepped into melee with them while Kathy an Ernie hung back and slung spells. The battle lasted several rounds with Tony getting choked several times, but no one was seriously injured.

After scarfing up the treasure, the party realized that they were very near the exit that was close to Stonekeep, so they went back to cash in some items, rest and resupply. When they arrived in Stonekeep, Ceodoc immediately approached them and asked them to take him somewhere, once they had rested and resupplied. Long ago, he had set up a trap to cause an avalanche in the valley that led to Stonekeep's front gate and he felt like it was time to set it off. The party agreed and a couple of days later, they made their way into the mountains to the west.

A few hours after leaving, they were ambushed by their old enemy, the goblin/wolf creature. It had brought along reinforcements, an orc wizard, a kobold monk and a bugbear ranger. Assuming the kobold was a sorcerer, Tony sent his wolf to attack it. The kobold quickly pummeled the wolf into unconsciousness, then charged into the melee. Tony went after the bugbear, trading blows, but appearing to be on the loosing end. The orc wizard shot a fireball into the group, burning nearly everyone. Brad shot the wizard with his crossbow, then went to assist Tony. Kathy decided to show the orc wizard how it was done, casting her own fireball back at him and burning him to a crisp. Ernie shot an offensive spell at the goblin/wolf then moved to heal Tony. Greg went straight at the creature, who was blinking, and missed on his first attack. However, on his second try, Greg hit the creature and unloaded his full psychic damage, splitting the creature in half. The battle did not last long after that. Brad and Tony finished off the Bugbear and the rest of the party surrounded the kobold, who died before he could escape.

Episode 2.4

Greg, Wendell, Brad, Kathy, Ernie

(at Wendell's House)

The group continued to explore the caves, deciding to head over towards the "Sun Hole." They ran into several monsters along the way.

The first group they encountered was three wights, who charged at them from out of the darkness. They surrounded Greg, striking him once. He felt the chill of death begin to drain his life force away, but managed to resist the effect. Ernie then turned them...into dust.

Further on, they were attacked by swarms of bats. Kathy dispursed the first two swarms with a fireball, but the last swarm surrounded part of the group and began biting them. Everyone spread out but continued to attack the swarm. Greg eventually disbursed the final swarm with a swipe of his sword. Greg, Wendell, Brad and Ernie had all been injured and found that their wounds kept bleeding and that they were still taking damage. Ernie used most of healing spells to stop the bleeding and repair everyone's damage.

Since it was on the way, they decided to make another stop at the ruins, where they killed the troll, to take a much-needed rest. The cave was now occupied by three more wights. Wendell tried to sneak into the cave, but was noticed. He decided to move out into the room with the torch, so that the spellcasters could see and attack the wights. Kathy followed through, hitting a wight with her lesser sonic orb wand and Brad fired his crossbow. Before Ernie could act, the three wights surrounded Wendell and attacked. They hit him twice and caused one negative level. Ernie then stepped up, called upon his deity, and destroyed the wights.

The group rested and the next day, Ernie cast as many helpful spells as he could on Wendell to aid him in throwing off the negative level. Wendell recovered and the negative level went away.

Moving on to the "sun hole", they found an opening into the mountains. The "sun hole" was at the bottom of a sinkhole that had opened where the bases of several mountains intersected. Water ran down the sides, some of it disappearing into a crack in the earth, while the rest ran down the tunnel the party had entered. The area was lush with vegetation, ferns, moss, shrubs and small trees. It was also teeming with animal life. The group spotted some eagles circling overhead and several small animals scurrying around the hole itself. The sides of the hole were very steep, making a climb out very difficult.

They explored the area carefully, staying together. When they reached the far side of the shocked to discover a gargantuan snake curled up amongst the ferns – shocked by how big it was and how close they had gotten to it before seeing it. Unhappy about being disturbed in it’s lair, it towered above them taller than any tree in the area. Greg boldly stepped up to face it while the rest of the party scattered like so many frightened rabbits. He plunged his glowing green sword into it’s belly, unleashing his full psychic potential. The snake hissed angrily and tried to bite him in retaliation, but missed. The rest of the party hung back, shot missile weapons and cast spells. Greg decided that being so close to the snake may not be such a good idea, so he hopped back and threw his blade instead. The snake again tried to pursue and bite him and again missed completely. After another round or so, Ernie cast Briar Web and the unfortunate snake became trapped in the thorns. Before it could escape the thorns, the combined attacks of the party killed it. The party stared in disbelief for a moment, unable to understand how they managed to kill such a massive beast without suffering so much as a scratch, then they searched for treasure. They found a potion, a magical shield, a necklace of missiles and a mithral shirt.

Episode 2.3

Tony, Ernie, Brad, Kathy, Greg, Bob (in an extended New Year’s Day special edition)

They walked up to meet the grimlocks and discovered a nasty site. The dead body of a hydra lay in a side alcove. It looked as if its flesh had been shredded. It had also been sitting there for at least a day.

There were five grimlocks, including one leader. Bob talked to them, telling them that the party was in the tunnels hunting troglodytes. This put the grimlocks at ease. The grimlocks told them that the they had wiped out what was left of the troglodytes and gave the troglodyte king to the grimlock cheif's pet as a plaything. This made the other grimlocks laugh. They also told the party that the hydra had been killed by a monster they referred to as "the Destroyer." They said it used to live in a cave that had ruins in it, but that it recently started wandering the tunnels. It was obvious that they were very afraid of it.

As if on cue, another grimlock ran up from behind his comrades exclaiming that the destroyer was coming. The grimlocks made a hasty retreat, running past the party, and went in the only direction they could - towards the entrance the party had just come from. Realising that Edic was waiting at the exit to attack any grimlocks that might show up, and not wanting to risk a fight with whatever had scared the grimlocks so much, the party decided to follow the grimlocks to the exit.

They reached the end of the tunnel just in time to hear Edic ambushing the grimlock captain. Very quickly, Edic was nearly surrounded. The party quickly jumped into the fray, Tony, Greg and Brad heading into combat, Bob firing off magic missiles, Kathy using her wand and Ernie hanging back to heal. The fight was over quickly, but as it ended, Kathy and Ernie heard something walking down the tunnel.

The party moved to each side of the tunnel entrance and waited. The creature approached the end of the tunnel, but did not exit. Only Tony was at an angle that allowed him to see the creature. It was almost as large as a horse, walked on two legs and a long neck with a very large maw on it's head.

It paused for a moment, as if it was thinking, then raised its head slightly and flexed its muscles. The group heard a very low frequency sound and then the tunnel entrance collapsed.

After the dust settled, they examined the bodies of the grimlocks. In addition to some armor and magical batleaxe, they found an odd scrap of leather with lines and grooves carved into one side. The took a peice of parchment and made a rubbing. It turned out to be a partial map of the tunnel system. The next day, Ernie used magic to translate the symbols. The areas on the map were labeled home, stranglers, rift, snake people, sun hole, lake, surface, ruins, Troglodyte king, and Troglodyte. The wanted to use the map to explore, but were uncertain where they were or where they should go once they figured out where they were. There was an interesting debate as to whether the Sun Hole referred to an exit to the out doors or to a hole from which lava flowed. They eventually came to the conclusion that the section of the map labeled Troglodyte and Troglodyte King represented the area where they had fought them in their lair. They decided to start exploring from that location, which meant traveling overland for a day to get to that entrance.

On the way, they were attacked by a pair of owlbears. Several characters spotted them before the ambush. Tony tried to outflank them but one of the two owlbears decided that it just made him an easy target. It attacked Tony then wrapped him up in a bear hug, nearly killing him. Tony fought back, causing serious damage, but was obviously on the loosing end of the battle. Greg raced over to assist Tony. He attacked the owlbear, killing it before it made Tony into a snack.

Meanwhile, Kathy enlarged Brad who then got into a boxing match with second owlbear. Between Brad's fists, Bob's magic missiles and Kathy's wand, they killed the owlbear in just a few rounds.

Ernie healed all the injured party members. They looked around for tracks, expecting to find traces of the goblin/wolf creature that was involved in the last owlbear attack, but they found no traces of it.

Once inside the cave, they made their way to the troglodyte lair. It was much more damaged than when they were last here. All the doors were broken down and one had a six foot diameter hole cut through the center of it. They found some troglodyte body parts, lots of ransacked rooms, and what must have been a throne room and an egg chamber. All the eggs were destroyed. From there, they decided to just explore nearby the marked areas of the map.

The next area they encountered was labeled on the map as Ruins. It was a large cave filled with large blocks of cut stone. Along the floor of the cave, was the remains of a broken structure – a hollow triangle which must have stood about 90 feet tall. The base of it, ten feet high, ten feet thick and over 100 feet wide, was still mostly intact. On the far left edge, they could see the beginning of one side of the triangle, but it was broken about 25 feet off the ground.

The room was not uninhabited. As soon as they entered the room, a large creature attacked them. It was obviously some type of troll, but bigger and much stronger than any troll they had seen before. Tony again tried to move to a flanking position and hide. Kathy enlarged Brad, who waited the creature to come to him. Bob began firing magic missiles. The creature moved in to attack and struck Brad with its claws. Its blow was tremendously damaging. Brad knew he could not trade blows with this monster for very long. Ernie cast prayer, hoping to improve everyone’s chances. Greg moved in to attack and suffered a very damaging attack of opportunity for his trouble. Tony moved in to flank the creature. Kathy got out her wand and began hitting it with lesser Sonic Orbs. Brad stood his ground, pounding it in the head repeatedly with his fists.

Even as its body visibly regenerated, the creature struck back, seemingly in all directions, attacking Brad, Greg and Tony. Brad was nearly down. Bob, in an effort to save Brad, made him invisible. The creature, being not very bright and momentarily confused when it’s largest and most dangerous foe suddenly vanished, decided to make its way towards Kathy and her annoying Lesser Sonic Orbs. This provoked a flurry of attacks of opportunity from Greg, Tony and Brad, who then became visible. Having suddenly found the giant sized monk again, it renewed its attacks against Brad. One more strike from his claws and down went the monk. Greg and Tony continued the attack, though they didn’t appear to be up to the task. Bob and Kathy helped them out with spells, but things were not looking good. Ernie finally squeezed his way close enough to Brad to heal him just before he died.

Deciding to stay on ground, the very injured but still enlarged monk began kicking furiously at the troll. Another nail-biting round later, the beast finally went down, using its final act to strike out one last time at Greg. The spellcasters quickly dug through their belongings for any type of acid or fire while Tony, Greg and Brad continued to slice, slash and pummel the troll’s body into ever smaller pieces before it could regenerate and get back up. After several minutes, they created enough of a fire to destroy the troll’s body.

After a few minutes of panting and healing, the party searched the cave. The troll had only a little treasure – some gold, and a couple of potions. They examined the remains of the triangle and found two small square indentions, perhaps two inches on a side and an inch deep, at the two corners of the base of the triangle. They also found a broken stone icon that, when pieced together, fit nicely in the hole. The icon had the symbol for the number one on it – in dwarven. They also discovered two smaller exits, tunnels too small for the troll to fit in.

They rested in one of the small tunnels and then began to explore more. They discovered the way back to the part of the caves they had been in before, the part that led to Haven and the Spirit of the Mountain (who was still not home). They found a lake. The tunnel dead ended there and they had to turn around. The next place they wanted to see was the Sun Hole.