The End of an Enemy

With the start of combat, the heroes quickly found movement within the room extremely difficult. Traps blocked many of the paths to Simon and Rudy's attempt to leap over a pit ended with him being pulled down into it. Realizing Simon wouldn't move very much, Kuppies cast the most important spell of his life. He put a stinking cloud, that encompassed all of the area Simon was likely to occupy.

After the first round, 2 of the gargoyle statues came to life and flew across the room, attempting to knock characters into the pits. Eventually, Ekeraath ended up in a pit facing a scared Kriv. Leenia faced a spider, and Rudy was trapped in a flooding chamber.

Mara made her way to a lever and pulled it in the hopes it would disarm the necrotic mist traps. What happened was the exact opposite, the traps went off and included the squares adjacent to the holes. The benefit to this was the traps took 2 rounds to recharge, so they could be easily passed.

As combat wore on, the gargoyles proved even more troublesome as they were able to pick up and move Simon throughout the room. Finally, the party began to destroy the gargoyles by pulling the statues off the balconies. Add to that, Kuppies stinking cloud, and the monsters were taking a beating.

On the other side of the coin, the party was running out of healing. A massive blast by Simon, severely hurt Kuppies and Alexander. And when it was followed up with a lightening bolt, Kuppies went down, not to rise without the aid of someone else. Fortunately for him, Alexander was able to inspire him to return to combat and maintain the cloud.

With 3 of the 4 gargoyles destroyed, and most of the pit traps resolved, the heroes rose to the occasion and looked to finish off Simon. Rudy landed a blow that had ongoing damage and Kuppies added ongoing fire damage on top of that. When Ekeraath followed that up with a massive blow that shattered Simon's soul rod, his death was all but assured. When it was finally his turn, he fell before he could act, as the ongoing damage did him in.

Turning their attention to the half elf on the table in the back, the party found Varis.