Week 4 of Tomb of the Serpent Kings.
Only three players showed up this week - a wizard, a cleric, and a ranger. The missing three player characters get what we call "the Brain Jellies" or "Crypt Cough", a kind of catatonic coma where they can mindlessly walk around with their companions. However, in this case, it was decided to leave them safe with fungus goblins.
The three remaining PCs spent time and searched the goblin caves and found treasure! They found the stairway leading to the surface.
They figured out the rotating drum door and climbed the stairs, carefully avoiding looking in the direction of the basilisk room they already knew was there, to the lair of the lich, opened the door, met the lich - who was remarkably cordial and accommodating. The cleric produced his holy symbol and tried to turn the lich (ha ha ha!). The lich acted all afraid, then became serious, stepped forward menacingly, and crushed the holy symbol. There was a moment of "ohshitohshitohshit!" The lich turned to the others, "Did you bring this one to me? Excellent, I will feast well! You will be rewarded for your gift!" The PCs said no, which triggered the lich's suspicions. He tried to invite them in for tea but the PCs refused, slammed the door closed, and wisely ran away.
They went to the room with the ever burning sacrifice pit and saw treasure beneath the flames. They tied a rope around the cleric and lowered him down. The cleric failed his saving throw and started to pass out so they hauled him back up. They repeated and this time he made it. More treasure!
They went up the stairs to the other side of the basilisk room, found the stone eggs, almost stepped on a trapped block in the swinging blade trap corridor, but a lucky saving throw saved the cleric. They decided to avoid the entire corridor and go all the way back around, through the slave room, and up the stairs on the other side.
They pretty quickly figured out the rotating statue. MORE treasure! I read it wrong and thought it said 2d100x10 gp (x10 for OSE) which would have given them 7300 gp! They got super excited. But I caught my error, 2d100+10 gp (x10 for OSE), so they got 840 gp instead. Still, not bad.
They found the succubus and were immediately suspicious. She ain't no botanist with amnesia! For one thing, the cobwebs at the entrance indicated no one had entered this room for years. For another thing, did she just say "Yes, I speak your human language!" Okay, uh-uh, bye.
I was SO disappointed! They had her true name in their notes from two weeks ago, but no one remembered that! I told them later and they were all "DUH!"
Oh, they also took the two life-like snake-men statues. MORE TREASURE! Except, Arrn the Wizard knows a wizard who lives in a tower two days away who collects these and would pay 10 TIMES the value! QUEST!
Let's see, from there the three PCs beat feet out of the dungeon via the newly found stairway exit, leaving the three PCs behind, returned to town with their loot! They split the treasure three ways so they leveled up!
They felt a little bad cutting the other three out of the treasure, but I told them if the remaining three clear out the remaining two rooms next week and split it three ways, they will catch up.
The remainder of the night was spent buying a small house in town, hiring mercenaries and staff for a caravan, buying a wagon and horses, and preparing for the actual hexcrawl which should start next week!
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