From the journal of Knight Justicar Percival, Order of Daybreak:
Mar 3: Our defensive preparations on the beach were successful and the denizens of this cursed island thought better of challenging us. Rested and resolved to see our mission through, we entered the dungeon down one PC and one henchman.
The first chamber was the lava room, the place of elemental power that we understood to be half of the significance of the location. We searched for some connection with the alleged sinkhole of evil but could find none. We did uncover an abomination claiming to be Kyros the henchman who had fallen in an earlier delve. Sanji bought the thing's story and they had a heartfelt, albeit uncomfortably warm, reunion. Zimon, with his new powers bestowed by the deity and cause of all this mess Sirlios, read from some scroll he had tucked away (?) and absorbed the elemental place of power.
This influenced the environment on some planar or dimensional level and everything quaked and shifted, revealing the heinous altar that anchored the sinkhole of evil. Atop the altar was a foul scene of depravity depicted in stone from which we would need to rescue Annie the priestess from the clutches of two large demons.
Pelor blessed us and we drank many potions and used scrolls to prepare ourselves for an assumed battle. We did not know what the demons were but we were certain they would be powerful. I approached and freed Annie with an elixir of depetrification, but this also released the demons. We expected this but underestimated just how powerful they might be. After a brutal battle, Zimon, Kyros, and I were downed, the party fled, and Fr. Cassian captured.
I'm told that Cassian negotiated our release by bartering the entirety of our magical equipment. The demons were confused as to their presence on our plane and traded his life and our bodies for more information. Our party extracted to the ship and departed the island, Zimon suffering permanent hearing loss but Pelor guiding Cassian's skills to restore me without any lasting wounds to more than my pride. We rescued the captured woman which was half of our mission and arguably the more important.
Mar 4: We ran afoul of some obstacle that damaged our ship. The sailors got to work repairing it but morale was low. I spent the rest of the voyage bolstering the spirits of the men. A passing privateer known to the sailors as Johnny Two-Timbers offered aid and we accepted, his reputation being of an acceptable sort, and we got underway faster because of it. I will pray for Johnny's safe sailing.
Mar 5: Bastia. A long and challenging adventure culminating in partial success and defeat in the face of Chaos left us frustrated and spent. We reported to Soto, delivered the girl, and collected our reward. I admonished the fence-sitting heretic to pick a side. In the face of such evil, remaining Neutral is as bad as swearing to Chaos. I hope he does not make himself my enemy. For his part, he was thankful and offered his ship to us to return to Bonevale. We accepted.
Zimon established contacts to offload some of our treasure and attempt to replenish what was lost. In terms of treasure, we're at a net loss. Two of the items traded to the demons were irreplaceable and priceless artifacts gained from the glade in the Dreadwood many months ago. This is a hit to our cause, but we remain in the fight. We will lick our wounds and rejoin the perpetual war against Chaos.
Musings:
This was a long and extremely difficult dungeon. We took the quest from the patron Soto after his inadvertent creation of his own problem. I think our assumption about the adventure was misguided, a much more casual beer and pretzels endeavor given that it seemed custom built for our party, was fabricated from thin air, and was extremely isolated on a deserted island. This did not lend itself to the type of preparation we might make for say a known dragon lair or a particularly valuable treasure map. These locations could be researched further, scouted, and approached with an eye towards logistics.
The dungeon itself had a bespoke mechanic or pattern to its layout that did not follow any conventional wisdom. Our frustration with it was that there were no clues to follow or puzzles to solve. We had to just figure it out, which we failed to do. The power level of the place was significant as well, the DM's attempt to offer us a challenge as he felt we were too easily defeating the encounters up to this point. Any missteps were unforgiving, compounded by an assumption that fleeing from combat into an indecipherable maze of seemingly random tunnels was going to get us to our objective.
There was quite a bit of treasure, commensurate with the fights that we could win, and we were doing quite well until the final battle despite our set backs. This was a mis-step of mine as Caller. I knew what the demons were, ACKS Pit Fiends or Balors, I think they're called Baleygr. I knew that we couldn't kill two of them. But I have trouble using meta knowledge to make in-character decisions. I'm also playing a paladin. I can't simply flee in the face of demonic forces. I will have to be better about utilizing my game knowledge effectively to make better decisions for the party as a whole, which is justified in-game as the Adventuring proficiency. I'd have still fallen in the battle, but Zimon and Cassian could have retreated with the rest of the party.
Ultimately our approach as players did not live up to the challenge offered to our characters and we suffered for it. The final result was anti-climactic due to just how large the gap was in the challenge faced versus our actual power level. Our only hope in that moment was to retrieve the girl and flee, which was only half our objective and a frankly unacceptable course of action for the paladin. Despite lacking role grading a la AD&D, I will not compromise my role.
We got out, we got paid, we rescued the girl. We failed to destroy the sinkhole and even worse had our (Zimon, Percival, and Cassian's) equipment taken as a result. It's a partial victory and an interesting point of contention with the Sirlios faith. If they insist on remaining Neutral while also introducing Chaos into the world, then we will unfortunately end up at odds. No quarter for Chaos.
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