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CHAPTER 1 | CHAPTER 2 | CHAPTER 3 | CHAPTER 4 | CHAPTER 5 | CHAPTER 6 | CHAPTER 7 | CHAPTER 8 | CHAPTER 9 | CHAPTER 10 | |
RETURN TO ATHKATLA
Elven War Camp
Here's a video that serves a largely narrative purpose. I emerge from the Underdark, and get questioned by the leader of an Elven War Camp, Eldan. He quests me with recovering the Rynn Lanthorn so that he can return his Elven forces to their home city. He gives me Elven Holy Waters and Wooden Stakes to help in my search for Bodhi.
Drizzt Do'Urden
The moment I leave for elsewhere, I run into Drizzt Do'Urden and his party. Avastrian has little trouble apologizing for their past encounter, and convincing Drizzt to help in his upcoming battle against Bodhi.
*Evil* Killing Drizzt Do'Urden
Of course, if you're so inclined and feeling evil, you can try to kill Drizzt. Keep in mind that you won't be able to keep any of the loot, since Malchol will come and take it away and you'll lose a potential ally against Bodhi, but anyway ...
Battles like this, where both sides start off without any spell protections, can present an interesting dilemma for your Mage. If he starts off right away with an offensive spell, does he leave himself vulnerable to those foes that survive? If he takes the time to put up spell protections for himself, does he leave time for the opposition to go to work? In this instance, Edwin's triple Skull Trap Spell Sequencer tips the answer in favour of starting first with an offensive blow. It doesn't have any effect on Drizzt or Cattie-brie. But it does bring Wulfgar and Bruenor down a few pegs, and kills Regis outright.
Meanwhile Asteroth will find himself in the thick of it soon enough, so he casts Ironskin right away. Korgan stays put, to avoid getting caught in Edwin's Spell Sequencer. Drizzt, Bruenor, and Wulfgar can hit hard, so Viconia whips out Defensive Harmony. Jan casts Mislead, with a few towards getting in as many backstabs as he can.
Now I want to bring down the survivors as fast as I can, so Edwin casts Haste while Viconia summons Improved Kitthix. Jan manages to waste Drizzt's pet panther with a backstab.
Wulfgar in the meantime kills off Jan's illusion, and then goes straight for Edwin, so he casts Stoneskin. Jan does as well when Bruenor takes aim at him. The party manages to bring down Bruenor rather quickly, so they go next for Wulfgar in order to protect Edwin.
Drizzt is now starting to score damage on Korgan, so the Dwarf heads over to Viconia so that she can Heal him. Jan casts Improved Invisibility to angle for another Backstab which doesn't quite work out, but by now he's got both Stoneskin and Mirror Image up so that he's not really in any danger. In fact it helps to distract Drizzt from going after Asteroth.
Edwin summons in a Mordekainen's Sword, and Viconia adds Mass Cure to bring everybody back up. Korgan also rejoins the battle.
It's only a matter of time before Drizzt falls under the sustained assault, and then Cattie. I don't bother keeping the loot with the exception of his Chainmail. Asteroth wears that until he's killed Bodhi, then switches over to the Shadow Dragon Scale because it will be after Bodhi's death that Malchol will start harassing the party.
Small Teeth Pass
I am now in the Small Teeth Pass. It's a small area, and there's not much to it other than killing groups of monsters, some of which have their difficulty scaled according to party level.
First I run into a group of Shadows, Wraiths, and Shadow Fiends, but they're easily dealt with after Avastrian gets them with a Fireball.
Across the bridge will be another group of undead monsters with nifty powers. There will be a Vampiric Mist that can level-drain with its attacks, a Mist Horror that can cast Confusion, a Poison Mist that can cause poisoning with its attacks, and a couple of Crimson Horrors that can cause Constitution draining with their attacks. They're routinely dealt with in physical combat, and Keldorn easily undoes the confusion with Dispel Magic.
Further west will be a few Ankhegs, who are now much easier to kill. Avastrian stows one of their shells into his Bag of Holding with a possible custom armor in mind.
Ertof Dand
I have a certainly priority to address now. Jaheira's romance takes a long time to complete, and there are certain prerequisites to finishing the romance. The sooner I fulfill the prerequisites, the better. I grab the opportunity for the first one.
Avastrian, Jaheira, and Imoen protect themselves with Stone(Iron)skin. I then sleep. A few bandits appear arround me, with their leader, named Ertof Dand, holding Jaheira hostage. Suffice to say that the self-sacrificial dialogue options are the optimum choices for keeping the romance active.
The band isn't high-level, so they won't pose much of a danger even after SCS improves their decision-making and has them guzzling potions. I follow the maxim of gang up on them one at a time for the most part. The one exception is where I have Avastrian nullify their lone spellcaster, a Cleric named Wurn, with his Celestial Fury.
Kruin
My next destination is the Docks District. There's a couple reasons for this. One is that some of the prerequisites for finishing Jaheira's romance start there, so I want to get those started as soon as possible.
The other is a reason is an upcoming fight that is inevitable when I first return to Athkatla. It will be against a large war band of Githyanki led by Kruin. Their placement will be completely random. Suffice to say that I prefer to fight them in a large open space with as few Athkatla citizens as possible being in proximity, so as to avoid any loss of reputation. The Docks District is the relatively best place for this objective.
Fortune smiles on me, as most of them are closely bunched together, and Imoen is able to aim her triple shot of Skull Traps (via her stored Spell Sequencer) at one of them who's a safe distance from both the party and any of the Athkatla citizens. This suffices to blow most of them away outright. The remaining danger is Kruin, who will try to hit the party with a Chaos spell as soon as he can. The antidote for this is to have Keldorn cast True Seeing, and then Avastrian bring down Kruin's defences with a Breach spell. Avastrian then keeps Kruin from casting spells by staying on top of him with the Celestial Fury.
Keep in mind that the placement of the Githyanki is completely random, and I had a stroke of good fortune here. It was also just as likely that they would have been more spread out and on all sides. If this happens, alternative strategies would have become necessary, like summoning Skeleton Warriors or using Insect Plague on some of them or using Silence 10' Radius on others, etc.
Kruin leaves behind the Hilt of the Silver Sword.
Now I begin a series of quests involving Jaheira.
