Session 11 - Scene 4 (of 5)

Out of the darkness, more forms begin to emerge out of the crypt – this time, a cadre of skeletons. Moving through the thunder, they take some damage but not before advancing on Zena, cutting into her twice with their swords. Two more slice into Krolec.

Leigh responds by sending out a scorching burst, hitting two of the skeletons and the remaining zombie. Sa-ika follows up with a pair of sword burst attacks, damaging the skeletons further. Zena finishes off the last zombie by slicing it in half with her sword.

Back at the side, Rhogar strikes the reaver with another enfeebling strike. It tries to attack him back, but is too weakened from his assault. Silas finishes it off with and overwhelming strike from his blade.

With the reaver dead, Merend turns his attention to the skeletons. He steps back and attempts to attack one of the ones attacking Krolec, using a flame of holy flame, but misses. As does Al's phantom bolt fired at the other skeleton on Krolec.

From the darkness, another rotting ball of filth hits Sa-ika. This is followed up by the skeletons, who cut into her, Krolec, and twice into Zena. Knowing he is seriously injured, Krolec makes a hasty retreat and gathers his strength. Rhogar moves into his place to attack one of the skeletons with his paladin's judgment, but his attack fails to hit.

As Sa-ika steps back to gather a second wind, Leigh blasts away at the skeletons, hitting three with another scorching burst. Silas tries to assist with his radiant vengeance, but misses, as does Merend's second attempt to hit with his flame strike.

A final figure begins to emerge from the crypt's dark recesses. The group looks in horror at the half-rotten creature as it rips out chucks of itself to throw at them – the creature is a corruption corpse.

Sa-ika is overcome with disgust and revulsion at having been hit twice by its attacks. As she retches, two skeletons move in on her, striking her down with their swords. Her unconscious, bloody body falls to the ground.

A short distance away, Al attacks one of the skeletons with his phantom bolts, nearly hitting it. Krolec's two arrow shots equally miss their marks.

Rhogar is worried that Sa-ika may die if not attended to quickly. He rushes past the skeleton fighting him, narrowly avoiding its sword, and over to Sa-ika. Laying on hands, he heals her back to consciousness. She crawls back behind Rhogar for protection, then slowly stands herself up.

Nearby, an excited Leigh sends off another scorching burst at the skeletons, this time killing two of them.

Now that the skeletons are almost finished off, Zena decides it'd be better to attack the corruption corpse. She rushes past the balls of thunder, taking slight injury, then attempts to assault the zombie creature with her harrier's ploy. The ploy fails.

Silas thinks Zena has the right idea. Sliding past a skeleton, he makes to an area directly away from the door. He attempts to use his powerful abjure undead ability to strike at the corpse as well as pull it through the balls of thunder. But his power falters at the last minute, and his scheme is lost. The corpse slides back from Zena, then blasts her with another ball of its rotting flesh.

Merend stops attempting to strike out with his attacks, and moves over to Sa-ika. Curing her wounds lightly, he helps to heal her. Al presses on against the skeletons using his phantom bolt, but misses again.

The skeletons respond by attacking Silas and Rhogar. The one attacking Silas missing, but the sword hits home into Rhogar. Krolec assists by firing off a couple of arrows, the last one finding its mark and taking out the skeleton on the paladin. Rhogar then steps forward, and cuts down the remaining skeleton with his sword.

Leigh sends out a magic missile, blasting into the corruption corpse. Sa-ika decides to move back to the front lines. She rushes into the crypt and attempts to use her lightning lure on the creature, but fails. Silas does no better with his attempt to use his oath of enmity.

Merend plots to use his beacon of hope spell, but observes that the group is too split out for him to heal everyone. He ultimately decides to heal those in the back group, believing that the front group acted foolishly in rushing into the crypt.

The corpse tries to slide back further into the crypt to get some room to maneuver, but still misses with another of its thrown hunks of filth.

Al moves into position outside the crypt, striking it with a phantom bolt. Krolec also positions himself to attack, and his two arrow shots finish off the creature. It explodes in a burst of diseased goop, but luckily everyone was standing far enough away to not be hit.

Session 11 - Scene 5 (of 5)

With the creature gone, the group heads in to make sure the rest of the crypt is clear. Krolec has them slowly advance forward, checking for traps at every moment along the way.

The only thing left in the crypt appears to be a single crypt vault. After making doubly sure there are no traps or sounds of movement, Krolec and Zena slowly lift the vault cover and move it partially to one side.

Looking inside, they see only the remains of an old soldier. Merend looks for an inscription, but the vault is too worn to read the name of the soldier. He was apparently some great captain or general in the Minotaur Wars.

The soldier is dressed in long-rusted armor and shield, with a suspiciously non-rusted sword lying next to him. Sa-ika quickly determines it is a magical blade – a lifedrinker longsword.

A brief discussion ensues about who should take the sword, but Krolec fails to make a final decision. He wants to sleep on it, pondering the moral implications of using such a weapon.

Once again, the group decides to seal themselves up in a crypt and rest for another day.

Session 11 - Session Notes

This session ended up being much shorter than last session.

I wanted to start off with some more exposition so I included the encounter with Nimozaran.  I also needed a moment to give the PCs a map of the area to make the communication easier.  I also thought it would be handy to have a way to check off the areas they cleared.  I also wanted a way to nudge them into saving the big finale with the dark crystal for last (it will be more climactic that way - plus I have something interesting planned for the final battle).

The other purpose was to try and get the wizards involved a little more.  And to show that people are starting to take notice of the group as they rise in power.

As time goes on, I will start introducing more of that line of plotting.  And not everyone will be thrilled about a group of individuals gaining power.

As for the combat encounter, that took a while to keep moving - mostly because several players weren't paying as close of attention as they should have been.  It was also a little slower for me having many different creatures to keep track of.

One interesting part was how it broke out - with a couple of mini battles and multiple phases with the skeletons coming after the zombies.  But the best part was the corruption corpse for the finale - because several players were actually disguisted over the description.  

The Lifedrinker Longblade sword was kind of interesting - a couple of the players were actualyl debating whether or not their character would have a moral quandry with using the weapon (not sure why it would be worse than other weapons).

I am starting to wonder how long this cemetery plot will last.  It could be several sessions long.  By the time they actually get to dealing with Kobald Hall, plus the Keep on the Shadowfell adventure I was going to use, they will probably be so powerful I'll have to drastically alter it, lol (after the session, the wizards are already at level 3).

One question did come up in the game - re: holy water.  There are no official rules for it in 4e, but I figured the rules for alchemical acid would be close enough that I could make up my own houserules for it.

Here's what I came up with:  
Holy water is an Alchemical Item. It is not merely any water given a blessing by a priest, but a vial of water mixed with specific herbal ingrediants (which vary by diety) and that has had a specific ritual ceremony performed on it.

Holy Water is essentially the same as Alchemical Acid, except that it only affects the undead and does radiant damage instead of acid damage.

So, if you want to make it yourself, you need the Alchemist feat and purchase the  formula for making it (for knowledge of the proper ingrediants and ritual) for 70 gp. Each vial of holy water then requires a 30 min ritual performed, and 25 gp worth of materials.

Alternately, you can buy it at the temple for 20 gp per vial.

The stat block is:
Power (Consumable, Radiant): Standard Action. Make an attack: Ranged 5/10; +4 vs. Reflex; on a hit, the attack deals 1d10 radiant damage to any undead creature, and ongoing 5 radiant damage (save ends); on miss, half damage and no ongoing radiant damage.

Session 12 - Cast of Characters

Krolec Jar'bin - Elven Ranger
Rhogar - Dragonborn Paladin
Leigh - Eladrin Wizard
Al Trueism - Human Wizard
Mitka Karamazov - Halfling Rogue
Scrag Graveborn - Half-Orc Warden
Zena - Human Fighter
Sa-ika - Genasi Swordmage

Session 12 - Scene 1 (of 4)

A knock at the door of the tomb begins the day for the group, as Mitka returns with Scrag.  As Krolec gathers everyone together, he decides that Zena and Sa-ika should draw straws to see which of them will use the lifedrinker longsword they found in the crypt.  Sa-ika wins, and Zena feels a bad omen over her.

With the matter decided, everyone exits the crypt and prepares to head further into the cemetery.  However, Merend suddenly remembers that it is St. Smithen's Day, named after the former Nentir Empire bishop and now patron saint of good weather (after having nothing but clear weather for 40 days after his death), and he will need to return to the temple to perform his priestly duties at the feast.  Silas also needs to head back to his temple for similar reasons.  As the champion of Bahamut, Rhogar's greater mission is to continue with the others and help keep them protected (though he does lament missing the festivities).

However, the group begins to get nervous without their healer.  Sa-ika realizes that relying only on one healer for such a large group is probably a mistake, and plans to learn enough of the ways of the warlord to inspire others to continue fighting in battle (after deciding learning the ways of the cleric wouldn't suit her).  As an immediate solution, Krolec decides they should spend the majority of their current gold on healing potions from the Temple of Erathis, at the previously offered lower rate.

A short while later, and the group is heading back into the tombwoods after having purchased their healing potions.  Krolec takes one for himself, handing out the other three to Sa-ika, Scrag, and Zena (feeling the still-weakened Rhogar should still avoid fighting on the front lines until he has sufficiently recovered from his death experience).

It doesn't take long before the group finally reaches the end of the path and comes within sight of the inner cemetery.  Thick, tall stone walls surround the area, but have largely fallen in places.  The remaining sections of the wall are covered in thick, overgrown vines, as is the large iron gate at the end of the path.

The gate isn't locked, but has collapsed off its hinge.  Concerned about making noise, Krolec decides not to try and move the rusty old gate but simply go around it instead, passing through one of the sections of collapsed wall.

Session 12 - Scene 2 (of 4)

Once inside the cemetery, Krolec observes the entire area is badly overgrown with many trees and foliage restricting visibility.  Immediately in front of the group is a small, L-shaped stone building.  Leigh surmises it was the old groundskeeper's building back when the cemetery was in use.

Krolec has Mitka move up to check the iron door leading into the building.  Mitka does not discover any traps, nor does the door appear to be locked.  However, he does spot some runes, glowing with a soft blue color, on the stoop of the door.  He also stops to listen at the door, but hears nothing in the room beyond.

Leigh moves in to examine the runes.  She determines they are a ward against the undead.  Undead cannot cross the barrier.  Rhogar wonders if it is meant to keep the undead out.... or in.  Krolec decides they should investigate, as after clearing the area the building will provide an excellent safehouse for when they need to rest (rather than going all the way back to town).

Krolec has everyone stand back.  He thrusts open the doors, and rushes back.  They open to a very dark chamber.  Al uses his magic to create another of his glowing rocks, and tosses it inside.  The initial area of the building is empty except for a couple of old tables, but there is a glowing set of red runes halfway through the room, and a set of unmoving figures beyond them.

Looking closely at the figures from the doorway, Krolec and Mitka see there are two humanoid statues with an arbalest between them.  In front of them are two dog-like forms made of metal, and next to a doorway (leading to the other half of the "L") appears to be a metal snake.  They are homunculi, and Krolec immediately suspects they have something to do with the red runes.  He warns Mitka and the others not to get too close to the runes.

Cautiously moving inside, Krolec and Mitka begin advancing while looking carefully for traps.  Al and Sa-ika move in behind them, wanting to get a closer look at the runes.  They confirm that the runes are alarm runes, and that passing over their plane in the room will activate the homunculi.

Mitka wonders if firing his crossbow past the runes will activate them.  Sa-ika confirms it will, but Mitka thinks perhaps they should do it just to see what happens.  Al suggests if he's going to set off the alarm, he may as well fire at one of the homunculi.  Mitka also ruminates on trying to run past the figures to see what is around the corner.  Rhogar decides Mikta may do something foolhardy and heads out, with Sa-ika and Zena quickly following.

Krolec finds it all to be a terrible idea.  He believes here is no reason for them to break the line of the runes and would be needlessly putting themselves at risk.  Mitka isn't sure there is a large danger as long as he stays out of the path of the arbalest, until Krolec reminds him it can likely move.

Al and others mention the possibility that something useful could be behind the barrier, but Krolec repeats that it is an unnecessary risk and could jeopardize their ability to use the building as a safe house (though some wonder about resting there while not knowing what is behind the corner, or trusting the homunculi).

In the end, everyone decides they will move on and deal with the issue later.  Just to be safe, as they leave, Krolec yells out a greeting into the room, asking if anyone is there.  To his surprise, he gets a response of, "hello".  It appears to be one of the statues speaking.

Krolec and Mitka head back over near the line to speak to the statue.  When asked who he is, the statue explains that he is the guardian of the chamber and that Krolec and the others are free to enter (and stay) so long as they do not pass the red line.

Krolec wants to know what the guardian knows of the area.  It replies that it knows nothing except what its master created it to do – guard this area.  Mitka asks what they are guarding and the guardian explains that the room beyond holds an altar to Kord, the god of thunder and battle.  The altar was specifically built to be able to destroy the dark crystal of Herwest the necromancer.

Beginning to understand why this area is guarded and who established it, Krolec explains that his group is on a mission to clear out the cemetery and destroy the crystal.  He asks the guardian if this will allow them to pass to the altar beyond.  The guardian explains that even his master would not be allowed.  They must hand over the crystal to the guardian, and only he can take it to the room beyond to be destroyed.  After promising to return with the crystal, Krolec and Mitka leave and explain the situation to the others.

Session 12 - Scene 3 (of 4)

After making sure the immediate area is free from undead, they head on to the nearest barrow.  After Mitka checks the door for traps and listens for any movement, they open it and head inside.  They do find remains in their catacombs, but no obvious undead.  Krolec prods a little with his sword, just to be safe.

It then occurs to him they will need to decide whether to desecrate the remains, or risk them being re-animated later.  They aren't really sure how the crystal's magic works at this point.  Krolec decides being cautious is more prudent, but ensures the remains are cremated in their barrows so as to disturb them as little as possible.  He also has Rhogar give a blessing.  As the most experienced cremationist in the group, Scrag performs the actual burning.

From outside, everyone watches as the smoke escapes from the barrow.  The heat causes the barrow to implode slightly, as the old stones become unstable.

Moving on to the next barrow, Mitka performs his usual set of tasks again.  This time, he still finds no traps but does hears something stirring about inside.  Krolec once again thrusts open the door and quickly moves aside.  The passageway into this one is partially blocked by a collapsed wall.

Al prepares to throw a lighted rock, but Krolec decides using an arrow might be more prudent.  Al responds that he supposes Krolec can tie the rock to an arrow, until Krolec explains he meant Al to actually enchant the arrow itself.

Firing the arrow in, the area is lit up, immediately disturbing its inhabitants, a large nest of bats.  Two of the bats immediately burst into a flame form, revealing them to be fire bats.  Two others are the nasty type of shadowhunter bats the group saw before in the sewers.  There are also two very large dire bats, and four relatively small giant bats.

The fire bats fly out first.  They immediately swoop past a section of the bunched up group, setting Zena on fire.  The large dire bats following more slowly behind them.  Squeezing through the partially blocked opening, the first of the dire bats lets out a piercing screech that stuns Scrag, Zena, and Al.

Leigh immediately responds by firing off a scorching burst at the dire bats.  Krolec fires off a couple of shots with his bow, hitting the dire bat once.  Scrag and Al try to recover their senses, but cannot.

Next are the shadowhunter bats, they fly out through an opening in the ceiling of the barrow and begin making their way to flank the group.  The flock of giant bats then burst out from behind the dire bats, injuring Krolec and Scrag while failing to penetrate Zena or Sa-ika's armor.

Near the back, Rhogar chants a prayer and creates a sacred circle to aid everyone.  Sa-ika also focuses on defense, using her dimensional warp to swap places with the stunned Al then using a series of swordbursts to kill two of the giant bats (though failing to injure the dire bat).

Zena manages to recover from the flames engulfing her, but is unable to recover enough to do anything else.

Mitka moves into position to assist Krolec.  Using his deft strike, Mitka kills one of the giant bats.

The fire bats fly over again, this time lighting up Krolec, though Zena, Scrag, and Sa-ika are able to avoid further injury.  The large dire bat flies by Sa-ika, greatly injuring her with a nasty bite.  The second dire bat emerges and lets out its own piercing shriek, this time stunning only Rhogar.

Deciding they need to take down some enemies quickly, Leigh fires off her acid arrow at the dire bat, nearly killing it.  The resulting acid splash hits the remaining giant bat, melting it into nothingness.  Meanwhile, Al and Scrag finally recover themselves enough to fight on.

In the back, Krolec draws his swords and attempts to use his jaws of the wolf tactic on the fire bats, but fails.  He decides he needs to think about retraining to another skill, as this one seems to be not very useful in most situations.

Off to the sides, the shadowhunter bats fly by and make vicious attacks with their tails, slicing into Zena and Mitka.

Rhogar and Zena recover their senses while Sa-ika uses her lighting clash to blast one of the dire bats into oblivion.  Mitka decides to once again attempt his handspring assault.  He finally succeeds, hitting one of the fire bats, thinking to himself that his extra practice has finally paid off.  However, his follow-up attempt to hit with a torturous strike is less successful.

The fire bats split up and head out in two different directions.  One flies over Rhogar, Scrag, and Zena.  Missing the first two, it does succeed in enflaming Zena again.  Meanwhile, the other misses Mitka as it flies over, but does engulf Leigh in flames.  Leigh responds by blasting it back with one of her magic missiles.

Al wants to pin down some of the bats to keep them from doing their fly-by attacks.  He attempts to use his spinning vortex spell on one of the shadowhunter bats, but fails.  He then activates his guardian blades to protect himself.

On the other side of the battlefield, the dire bat has moved in and bitten Zena.  She falls to the ground, unconscious, still afire.

Session 12 - Scene 4 (of 4)

Seeing the situation is dire, Scrag uses his earth warden powers to transform into his panther form.  He charges ahead at the nearest fire bat, striking it down.

Krolec takes a moment to try and recover.  He gains a second wind, but cannot stop himself from continuing to burn.

The shadowhunter bats swoop in again, missing Rhogar but injuring Leigh.  She notes to herself that this is the most injured she's ever been.

Rhogar rushes over to Zena, recovering her by laying on hands (though making sure to avoid the parts of her still on fire).  He them blasts out with his poison breath, driving back the dire bat.

Sa-ika throws her sword at the nearest fire bat.  The whirling blade slices it in half then returns to her hand.

Zena, still on fire, tries to gather her strength to continue on.  After catching a breath, she downs her healing potion and stands up.

Mitka attempts to finish off the remaining dire bat, but misses with his piercing strike.  The dire bat responds by biting him while the fire bats fly over Rhogar and Zena, blasting them both with flames.

Meanwhile, Leigh pauses to catch a breath and recover.  She then fires off a flaming sphere at the nearby shadowhunter bat.  

Al tries to attack the remaining fire bat with his rolling thunder spell, but misses.  Scrag continues his panther charge at the fire bat, attacking twice with his warden's fury.  One of the hits wounds the fire bat.  Krolec assists with two shots from his bow, finally killing it.  Krolec is also pleased the flames on him have finally died out.

The shadowhunters swoop in again, hitting Leigh but missing Scrag.

Rhogar uses a prayer to douse the flames engulfing Zena.  He then attempts to strike down the dire bat with his paladin's judgment, but misses.  He also fails to put out the flames on himself.

Sa-ika uses the energy from her bestial armor, charging the dire bat with her full might.  Her strikes cut it down.

Zena readies herself, full of fury for having been unable to act before now and having taken so much punishment.  With a vigorous yell, she charges forward and strikes down a shadowhunter bat with her harrier's ploy tactic.

Off to the side, Mitka switches to his crossbow and fires at the remaining shadowhunter bat on the other side of the battlefield.  Leigh assists him by blasting it with her burning hands spell (this time avoiding any horses).  Al hits it with his force orb spell as well.  In the end, Krolec gets the killing shot by downing it with a couple of arrows.

With all the bats dead, the group cautiously move into the barrow.  Krolec searches around to find anything, but is disappointed to discover no rewards for their fight other than a pile of bat guano and some inanimate remains.  There is a stone crypt at the back, but he and Rhogar discover nothing of interest in it.

The same prayers are said by Rhogar, and Scrag uses the bat guano to create a great fire.  As they walk away, the barrow completely collapses in flames.  Krolec wonders if they can avoid going inside future barrows as they walk back to the groundskeeper's building to rest for another day.  He begins to think that the mission to clear the area will be a long campaign, indeed.

Session 12 - Session Notes

Ah, poor Zena.  For a minute there I thought she might not get to do anything that session, lol.  The funny part is that player is someone I work with, and she kept joking that she was being punished for transferring off of my team (which happened a couple of weeks ago).

In any event, it was a fairly entertaining session.  I actually had to yell at everyone at the beginning though, because there's been a bad habit lately of people having side conversations and not paying attention to everything going on.  After I told everyone to pay attention or else I'd be cutting the group size down to six people, that seemed to get things back to normal.  I hate to be grumpy like that, but sometimes you have to really crack some heads to keep order in a larger group.  And to think that some of them still wonder why I won't let all 10 people play at once...

The whole St. Smithen's Day thing (an obvious parody of St. Swithin's Day, though I don't know if anyone else completely caught that) was just the excuse to explain the absence of Merend and Silas.  The Merend player did actually attend the session (as the Scrag player is his kid), but decided to give up his slot to the Mitka player (who really would like to be a regular, if we had the room).

Boy were some people really freaked about not having a healer.  The Sa-ika player kept trying to get me to let her retraining to a multi-class feat, but I told her she had to wait until she gained a level.  The Krolec player settled on buying the four healing potions, though at one point was thinking about hiring one of the priests of Erathis to set up some kind of MASH unit at Scrag's place, lol.

The vines at the gates of the cemetery were actually a monster, but they avoided that encounter by moving around it.

The homunculi at the groundskeeper's place actually had a little more story to tell (about the people who created them) but the players didn't seem all that interested in asking the guardian questions.

Once again, I'll just put out a reminder that the inner cemetery area is mostly using the "Lands of Darkness: The Barrow Grounds" adventure from Expeditious Retreat Press (though I have modified the story and encounters quite a bit).

The giant bats and dire bats were creatures I created the stats for myself.  The stunning ability of the dire bats might have been a little overpowered, I'm still not sure on that.  The giant bats were just minions.

The bat encounter was fun for me, because for once I had a lot of monsters with high mobility.  The PCs were pissed that everything could do fly-by attacks, preventing them from opportunity attacks.  And I finally put the wizards at real risk.

Despite that, the battle wasn't meant to be hard.  It was mostly a combination of bad rolls and bad luck that Zena nearly died (had no one been near her, the constantly burning fire could have finished her off quickly).  Humorously, the original plan Sa-ika had was to pour her healing potion down Zena's throat, lol (but Rhogar was before her in initiative).

At this rate, it could be a few months before the entire cemetery is done.  Which is strange, because now I have little to no session prep at all (having already prepped the entire cemetery).

What I'm really excited about is the super mega battle I have planned for the cemetery plaza.  For that, I'd like to have all 10 PCs participating and plan on having the absolute maximum number of enemies involved, coming at them in waves from all sides.  Should be truly epic (and take at least a couple of sessions).

By the time they get done, they will easily be 4th level or higher.  Which means I'll have to dramatically increase the encounters for Kobald Hall and the Keep on the Shadowfell adventure (or maybe just leave Kobald Hall to see how easily they slice through it now).

Session 13 - Cast of Characters

Krolec Jar'Bin - Elven ranger and leader of the group
Merend - Dwarven cleric  of Bahamut and second in command
Rhogar - Dragonborn paladin of Bahamut
Silas Ballard - Human avenger of Erathis
Leigh - Eladrin wizard
Al - Human wizard
Sa-ika - Genasi stormsoul swordmage
Scrag Graveborn - Half-orc earth warden recluse

Session 13 - Scene 1 (of 6)

Merend and Silas, full from the feasting of the St. Smithen's Day celebration back in town, make their way into the forest.  After failing to find the group resting at Scrag's shack, or at the three mausoleums outside the cemetery, Merend decides they should head towards the cemetery to find the others.  At the end of the path, they get near the cemetery gate.  

Seeing that the gate and surrounding walls are overgrown, Merend decides he and Silas should step back a little into cover, and keep an eye out for anything going on.  A short while later, he hears a metal door open from inside the cemetery, and sees the others as they step out of a nearby stone building.

Being a bit on the paranoid side, Merend motions to Silas that they should remain hidden until he gets a better idea of what is going on.  Silas silently agrees.  However, they are not hidden very well, and Krolec easily spots them as he scans the area after emerging.  Walking over to the gate, he yells out to them.

Merend finally decides to emerge and talk with Krolec, but only after he sees Silas exit his concealment.  Krolec tells Merend about the gaps in the cemetery wall, and the whole group quickly meets up a few feet away.

Krolec explains what has happened recently to the group in Merend's absence.  Merend is particularly interested in what kind of tactics the group used against the bats.    As Krolec goes into detail, Merend is clearly second-guessing him.  However, Krolec brushes off the implied criticism with a smile, noting that he's sure now that Merend is back, the group will benefit from Merend's tactical knowledge.  Off to the side, Al wonders how it is that a priest would have much knowledge of battle tactics.

The matter then moves on to continuing with the clearing of the cemetery.  Krolec consults his map, and identifies a nearby double barrow – with one barrow built on to the front of another.  As they all prepare to go off , Zena and Mitka decide to go in the other direction,  scouting to make sure nothing sneaks up on the ground from behind.  Also, Merend insists on visiting the barrows they already cleared first, saying a brief prayer over them for the disturbed dead.

Arranging everyone into their tactical marching order, Krolec leads everyone off towards the large barrow.  On their way, they hear a strange growling sound from behind a nearby grove of trees.  Emerging out of them is a pack of undead gravehounds, with their exposed bones and organs from where their flesh has rotten away.

Session 13 - Scene 2 (of 6)

Despite being hounds, the gravehounds are still zombies and move quite slow and the group has plenty of time to react.  Scrag and Silas advance forward to get into combat position while Leigh blasts one of the hounds with her magic missile.  Rhogar decides to hold back, heeding Merend's advice not to rush in.

Upset that Silas and Scrag have foolishly rushed into a fight, and positioned themselves away from the others, Merend decides to hold back and position himself in the optimal location to be able to heal everyone else.  Al fires off one of his magic missiles at the gravehounds, but misses.

The gravehounds rush forward as fast as their awkward undead gait allows them to.  They are unable to reach Scrag, but one does charge into Silas, knocking him down.  The creature's teeth sink into his leg, causing him to grimace in pain.  He can feel his own flesh rotting where the undead creature has bitten him.

Sa-ika tries to help out Silas by using her lightning lure to pull the creature away, but fails.  Krolec likewise misses with two shots from his bow.

Scrag, however, has no problems holding his own.  Raising his axe high, he charges into battle with the gravehound approaching him, yelling out with his warden's fury.  The axe cleaves the creature's brain in twain, killing it instantly.

Silas stands up and attempts to use his abjure undead prayer, but fails.  Rhogar starts to move up to help, but he's too far away.  

Leigh hits one of the gravehounds with her magic missile, while Al follows up with his phantom bolt.  Merend tries to assist with a blast of scared flame, but misses.

The gravehounds strike again.  Silas is knocked back down, as is Scrag.  Both feel the necrotic bites of the hounds.

Sa-ika uses her lightning lure, pulling one of the gravehounds off of Silas.  Krolec follows up with a couple of arrows from his bow.  

Scrag pulls himself off the ground, brushing off the effects of the bite.  He slames into the gravehound in front of him with his strength of stone.

Leigh finishes off the gravehound in front of Sa-ika with her magic missile.  It its death throes, it lashes out a final bite at Sa-ika, sending her to the ground with a putrid bite.

Wanting to guard the rear, Rhogar holds back.  Silas, badly wounded, takes a minute to rest and recover from his injuries.  Merend assists with a healing word prayer for him.

Al blasts away at the other gravehound in front of Silas, hitting it.  The blasts distracts the gravehound long enough for Silas to avoid being hit again.  Sa-ika pulls herself up off the ground and lightning lures that hound over to her.  Krolec finishes it off with an arrow to the brain.

Scrag, however, is less lucky.  The gravehound on him hits him, knocking him to the ground again.  Once again, he pulls himself back up and smashes into the hound with his earthen strength.  Leigh follows up by blasting the undead creature with her magic missile while Silas blasts it with his radiant vengeance.

Rhogar continues to hold back, as Merend says a prayer to heal Sa-ika.  Al finishes off the zombie dog with his phantom bolt.  As it dies, it lashes out with a final attack against Scrag, but he moves away in time to avoid being hit.

Session 13 - Scene 3 (of 6)

A short while later, the group reaches the double barrow.  Krolec carefully examines the outside for traps or magic runes, but finds nothing.  The door to the barrow is unlocked.

Once again, Krolec quickly opens the door and rushes back as it opens into the darkness.  Al lights a stone and hands it to Krolec, who tosses it into the barrow.  The immediate area appears to be empty except for the burial chambers along the sides of the walls.

The light from the stone is not enough to see into passage leading into the second, back barrow.  Krolec has Al light one of his arrows, which he fires into the hall leading to the far room.   It, too, appears to be empty except for the unmoving dead; at least, from what they can see of the front half that is illuminated.

Krolec and Sa-ika decide to move in to investigate further.  Moving quietly, the advance in slowly, checking for traps as they go.  As they reach the middle of the front barrow, they split up to each investigate the sides of the room.  They find nothing out of the ordinary.

Krolec motions for Scrag and Silas to begin to enter behind them.  Just then, Merend yells out to them that they are getting too far away.  Krolec agrees, though wonders if yelling has alerted anything to their presence.  Krolec calls for the others to move up.

Krolec grabs the arrow from the hall and tosses it into the middle of the back barrow so they can get a better look.  There appears to be nothing of interest except for a stone crypt at the back of the room.  Krolec sees there is some kind of inscription on the crypt, but he is too far away to read it.

Al volunteers to go into the crypt and read the inscription.  It reads, "Here Lies Ja'kal Maksun".  Al remembers that Ja'Kal Maksun was a world renown bard of a couple centuries ago, famous for wearing only one red glove and having a collection of exotic animals as pets.

Krolec suddenly gets very nervous.  He wonders if the bard's crypt has been cursed somehow, having heard rumors in the past about bards who caused the dead to rise and dance.  With all the dead lying in the wall chambers, they could quickly become surrounded.

He has the others stand on guard while he examines the crypt.  It doesn't appear to be sealed except for the heavy lid.  Al argues for just leaving, but Sa-ika reminds him that they can't burn the crypt so they need to make sure it is empty first.  She and Krolec carefully lift off the lid of the tomb and place it down leaning against the stone container.

Inside is the inanimate skeleton of Ja'kal.  The rotten remains of his red glove can be seen on his right hand, but there is nothing else of interest buried with him.

Deciding the area is cleared, they all exit as Scrag builds his fire.  The barrows are quickly engulfed in flames.

Session 13 - Scene 4 (of 6)

The next two barrows are smaller, single barrows.  As they approach the first one, Al moves in to inspect it before anyone else.  Checking the hinges, he finds it opens in.  This discovery seems to placate his interest, and he moves back to allow Krolec to do his usual inspections.

After discovering the lack of traps on the door, Krolec finds that this barrow is actually locked.  After he fails to pick it, Scrag rushes in and kicks down the door, a maneuver not everyone finds as impressive or well-planned as Scrag finds it to be.

Scrag looks around, finding the barrow empty.  Merend and Rhogar say their prayers to the dead, and Scrag proceeds to burn the remains.

The next barrow lies directly below a large plaza.  Once again, the process is repeated – Al inspects the door, Krolec searches for traps, and Scrag smashes down the door.

This time, Krolec does spot a trap inside the barrow, directly in front of the open door.  It appears to be a false-floor pit.  He deftly sets it off, finding a ten foot pit below.  There is at least the remains of one person down there with an apparent broken neck.  Krolec tries to get a good look to see if the skeleton has anything of importance on him, but sees nothing other than rusty old armor.

Finding nothing else of interest in the barrow, and being talked out of trying to go down into the pit by Merend, Krolec decides it is cleared.  More prayers are said, and further remains are burnt by Scrag, who seems to grow increasingly happy with his work.

Session 13 - Scene 5 (of 6)

Krolec then heads the group into the plaza directly north of them.  The area is overgrown and difficult to see around in, particularly with the large hedges all around, obscuring certain areas.  It contains four barrows in it, laid out in the four cardinal directions.

As they move in, they see a group of statues in the middle.  Merend wonders if it is the statues of the Relcoff family that they've been looking for.

Krolec moves them in towards the western barrow.  Rhogar decides to advance over to the barrow walls, tapping at it with his sword.  He finds it to be of solid construction.

Everyone begins to move around to the front door of the barrow.  Merend wonders if anything will come out at them from the bushes.

But it is not the bushes they needed to worry about.  The barrows have been made home by large deathjump spiders, who immediately jump out at them from the different directions.  A swarm of demonweb spiders also emerges from underneath the statues.

The spiders are too quick for anyone to react.  The swarm moves in and bites Krolec.  As he feels their stinging bites and the poison flowing through his veins, he uses his ability to yield ground to move away from them, narrowly dodging a deathjump spider's leap at him in the process.

The other deathjump spiders jump onto Scrag, Silas, and Sa-ika, knocking them all down and biting them.  Scrag pulls himself back up almost immediately, and smashes into the spider with his strength of stone.

Sensing the danger of the situation, Al casts his rolling thunder spell, knocking two of the spiders back.  

Krolec moves in to one of the other spiders, slashing with his blades, hitting with the second hit, while shrugging off the effects of the spider poison in his veins.  Rhogar moves into flanking position to assist, but fails with his paladin's judgment prayer.  He then tries to hit it with his poison breath, but the spider is unaffected.

Leigh fires away with a scorching burst, hitting the demonweb swarm but missing the larger deathjump spider.

Sa-ika pulls herself off the ground and attempts to lightning lure one of the spiders closer to her, but fails to connect.  Silas has better luck.  After he stands, he scores a hit with his overwhelming strike manuever.

Merend moves up to stay within range of the others.  Sensing no one needs healing yet, he prayers for a lance of faith to strike one of the spiders, but it does not succeed.

The spiders strike back.  The swarm tries to hit Krolec again, but he fights them off.  As does Scrag, who avoids being injured by the deathjump spider on him.  Silas and Rhogar are not as lucky, with Rhogar hit once and Silas hit twice.  Both of them feel the weakening effect of the spider's poison.

Filled with adrenaline from the battle, Scrag transforms himself to his panther form, then charges and tears in at the spider in front of him.  He follows up with a thunder ram assault, knocking the spider back across the battlefield.

Al tries to assist Silas with a phantom bolt at one of the spiders on him, but misses.

Krolec decides again that discretion is the better part of valor.  He tries a hit and run attack at the spider in front of him.  He attack misses, but he does evade the spiders long enough to go and stop to catch his breath.

Rhogar decides to do a little defense, himself.  He says a prayer and conjures up a sacred circle to protect everyone in the group within, which is everyone but Silas and Scrag.  Merend makes a mental note that the two of them got too far away from everyone else again.

Leigh fires off another of her scorching bursts, this time blasting both a deathjump spider and the swarm of demonweb spiders.  Sa-ika uses her lighting lure to pull one of the spiders to her while Silas takes a moment to recover.  Merend assists him with another healing word.

The spider swarm then advances as Sa0ika, biting her.  A deathjump spider almost makes a vicious attack on Rhogar, but a quick prayer from Merend causes the bite to not cause nearly as much injury.

The two spiders on Silas, however, have more luck.  A couple of brutal bites later, and Silas is back to being injured again.  Scrag moves into a flanking position to assist him, smashing the spider with his strength of stone.  Al also tries to assist with a phantom bolt, but fails to affect the spider.

Back across the battlefield, Krolec switches to his bow and fires off two shots over his allies at the spider.  One misses and sticks in Merend's staff.  The other finds its mark, killing the deathjump spider Sa-ika was fighting.

Nearby, Rhogar attempts to hit the spider he is fighting with a shielding smite, but his attack falters.  Leigh has more success with another of her scorching bursts, eliminating the spider swarm and injuring the spider fighting Rhogar.

Sa-ika makes a bold gambit, using her dimensional vortex to swap places with Silas.  With the spiders surrounding her, she calls upon her promise of storm power and attacks with a series of two swordbursts.  Both times she manages to injure the spider in front of Scrag, but not the one on her other side.

Silas steps back a little from his new position, making sure to stay out of danger in his weakened state.  He fires off his radiant vengeance against the spider closest to him, hitting it.

With Silas now in range, Merend calls on his beacon of hope prayer, healing everyone except Sa-ika and Scrag.  He follows up by saying a healing word prayer for Sa-ika.

The healing effect is quickly lost, however, as the two spiders bite into Sa-ika.  Scrag tries to help out by slamming the spider nearest him with another mighty earth strength blow.

Krolec tries to help with another couple of arrow shots, but both fail to find their mark this time.  Rhogar uses a prayer to help Sa-ika shake off the effects of the spider's poison, then tries for an enfeebling strike on the spider in front of him, but his blade misses.  Leigh finishes it off, however, with another of her scorching bursts.

Across the battlefield, Sa-ika strikes out again with her swordburst, hitting both spiders.  One of them collapses from the attack, leaving a single spider standing.

Silas tries to take it down with his radiant vengeance, but fails.  As does Merend, who attempts to charge the spider with his warhammer.  The spider fairs no better, with Sa-ika avoiding its bite.

In the end, Scrag finishes it off with another of his powerful earthen blows, crushing through its carapace.