DDC - Combat

First Combat

We are flying along in Morgan's flying ship in the baronies, outside the Dark Circle. Liessa detects 8 minds appear on Telepathy. We are not surprised.

Pulse 1: We get the initiative. Liessa stuns a number of them. The ones that resist teleport into close, exploding on impact and turning their targets into stone. Sabrina, Ajax and Dunlan are turned to stone (no save). Vychan is hit but is not affected.
Pulse 2: The stunned creatures fall behind the ship and are out of range of spells. A spectral warrior destroys one of them. Another teleports to attack Saydar but Vychan steps in the way and absorbs the blow. Morgan casts Darkness around himself to prevent being targetted. Liessa steps into the darkness and hopes.
Pulse 3: A spectral warrior destroys another one. The last construct teleports next to the darkness and aims for Liessa but misses. It explodes when it hits the boat.

Second Combat

We are flying through the Dark Circle using Shadow Wings. We see a group of undead (approx 50) approaching on Shadow Wings so we land and prepare for combat. We have two pulses to prepare before they are on us.

Preparation: Quickness on everyone. Counterspells of Air Special and Necro Special on the ground (we already have our indiviudal Mind Special and Celestial Special counterspells on). Rank 20 light in the area. Trollskins on Engalton and Dunlan. Dark Weapons for Morgan and Sabrina. Enhance Enchantment (for damage) in the area. They land and Saydar casts Death Blades in an area and destroys a third of them. The skeletal knights seem unaffected.

Pulse 1: There are around 30 lesser undead and 3 Skeletal Knights riding Nightmares. We make our WP checks and resist being drained. We win the initiative. Sabrina and Morgan kill a number of them. The rest of the party prepare and trigger. Ash fills up the area we are standing in and we can't target them.

Pulse 2: Engalton triggers an invested Dragonflames, destroying a number of the lesser undead, the skeletal knights seem unaffected. Saydar casts Death Blades around the party, injuring Vychan and destroying most of the remaining undead. Morgan leaves the protection of the counterspells and destroys a few undead with his deadly weapons. Sabrina charges one of the Skeletal Knights and injures it.

Pulse 3: The Skeletal Knights fade into the astral and flee. All three escape. We mop up the remaining lesser undead. Around this time, each of us is hit with 3 Darts of Seeking. Each dart causes an automatic Spec. Grev. injury. The darts cause major damage to our armour and a number of us are poisoned.

Conclusions: The Skeletal Knights are observing us, learning our capabilities. They can move into the astral at will and we are unable to stop them. They have rat cloaks that absorb spells. We believe the Nightmares are the ones that travel astrally. We need to destroy the Nightmares and stop them leaving. The Knights themselves will need to be engaged in meleee to kill them. Adjacent figures have +25 on the dice roll.

Third Combat

We approach the temple and land on the top. It is surrounded by undead. We spot what appears to be a group conducting a ritual about 300 yards away. We power up and fly in a high arc to avoid most of the arrows and land about 20 feet away from the ritual. There are lesser undead everywhere (one every 5 ft), so we just land on them.

One Lich is conducting a ritual, around him is 10 ft of clear space
A Skeletal Knight riding a nightmare is at the edge of the ritual.
Lesser undead (mostly skeletons) take up every other available space.

Every pulse we must make 2xWP checks or lose around 300 WP. Luckily, the amulets from Quarash give us a chance to resist these checks, so they pose little threat to us.
Every pulse we are hit by a number of arrows. This results in a few minor scratches to Saydar, Liessa and Dunlan.

Arrival pulse: Sabrina fires a number of arrows into the Nightmare as we approach, Engalton lays down counterspells and Dunlan puts down a Rk 20 light. We resist an Increase Gravity spell. Saydar lands badly and ends up taking a spec grev to his secondary arm which is now useless. The ash appears, but we have taken potions that give us Enhanced Vision so we can see through it.

Pulse 1: Sabrina charges through the undead to reach the lich. She hits it hard, landing a Spec. Grec injury of enough power to kill it instantly. It collapses into dust and the Chalice of Blood that it was holding falls to the ground spilling blood everywhere. Sabrina is Death Cursed with +5 on all dice rolls.

Liessa uses arcane power to prepare and cast in a single action. She drains the Nightmare of some WP. In the second half-pulse she does the same thing and knocks the Nightmare unconscious.

Saydar casts Binding Lesser undead and tries to take control of 12 skeletons. They are already controlled at rank 20, but with rank 22 in his spell, Saydar gains control. The skeletons turn around and start fighting for our side.

Vychan charges the Skeletal Knight with his horns, then tries to hit it, but fumbles. In the seconds half-pulse he hits it again.

Morgan steps forward and destroys a number of lesser undead with his 6 attacks. Some skeletons try to close with him and are destroyed as he keeps them out. In the second half-pulse he attacks the skeletal knight.

Engalton lays down more counterspells

Dunlan triggers trollskins.

Pulse 2: Engalton casts disjunction.

Morgan, Sabrina and Vychan attack the Skeletal Knight and Morgan gets the killing blow, along with the Death Curse of +5 on dice rolls. When the Skeletal Knight is destroyed, it turns entirely to dust which shoots past Morgan towards a Cairn located around 200 yards away.

Saydar summons up a Spectral Warrior and gets it to start killing the undead.

Dunlan moves to investigate the site of the ritual.

Conclusion

We take a little more damage, but Engalton's healing repairs all our damage except the Spec. Grev. injury taken by Saydar. The greater undead are going to cause major problems if they all have death curses. We may have to die and get resurrected to clear the death curse if the modifiers get too high.

Fourth Combat

We fly from the ritual site to the Cairn. Land outside, DA, counterspell and open the door.

Pulse 1: Vychan kicks open the door. We are all affected by blackfire, but resist. Sabrina charges in and hits the insubstantial spectre. Morgan triggers spectral weapon. Engalton puts down counterspells. Saydar prepares and casts Detect Undead.

Pulse 2: The spectre disappears underground and flees. A stone sits on a plinth inside the Cairn. The stone has a highly magical aura that drains MA when you use magic on it. Sabrina and Dunlan both lose a point of MA trying to DA the stone before Engalton finally reads its aura. It is an unholy chaos stone, with an Aura closer to living but odd. We destroy the stone using Saydar's Blades of Death. The stone explodes and Saydar is covered in Chaos dust. He becomes stronger and more resiliant, but his remaining normal eye bulges out and becomes frog-like.

Conclusion: We come up with the following plan. We fly to each remaining Cairn, killing any inhabitants and destroying the Chaos stones. We then fly to each of the Kyanite crystals and collect them all. Once we have disrupted their plans, we destroy them all.

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~andrew-l/Temple.jpg

It appears that the undead forces are trying to open the temple doors using these Chaos stones. The Kyanite crystals are lined up between the stones and the door. They are acting as amplifiers for the magic.

First major battle

Arrows rain down upon us each pulse. High defense is good protection from the arrows, but about every 10 seconds someone takes a hit from an arrow. We pull the arrows out and keep moving. The forces of undead are oppressive and we are resisting 3 x WP or lose hundreds of WP points. So far, everyone has made their checks.

Destroying the Chaos Stones

We have already destroyed one stone. Five more remain.

Second Cairn: We quickly fly from one Cairn to the next. Arrows bounce off us as we fly to the Cairn. As we come in to land, Dunlan casts Rk 20 light and Engalton puts down an E & E Special Counterspell. We land safely in the area. There are no undead close by. Saydar casts his Blades of Death in an area targetted on the Cairn. We can hear the sounds of shattering stone and the magical backlash causes Saydar to lose a point of MA.

Vychan kicks the door in and checks that the stone is actually destroyed. A cloud of sparkling dust rolls out from the room and settles on Vychan. His arms both writhe and transform into tentacles. Apparently this does not prevent him from casting spells or using his weapons, so he remains happy. At this point Vychan remembers that he can see through stone and didn't need to open the door to check that the chaos stone was destroyed.

Third Cairn: We fly to the next Cairn, through the usual storm of arrows. The Rank 20 Light and Counterspells are placed according to our plan. We land safely and destroy the Chaos Stone using Saydar's Death Blades. Saydar resists the backlash.

Fourth Cairn: We repeat the process. This time it requires 2 casts of the Death Blades to destroy the Chaos Stone. Saydar fails to resist the backlash from the second cast and is drained another MA point.

Fifth Cairn: The Chaos stone is destroyed safely.

Sixth Cairn: The last Chaos Stone causes Saydar to lose another MA point.

Collecting the Kyanite crystals

There are eleven crystals to collect. We have already destroyed one crystal when we disrupted the ritual that the Lich was engaged in. We fly from the Cairn to location of the second crystal. As we approach, Dunlan casts Rk 20 Light and Engalton puts down an E & E Special Counterspell in the area. We land safely. Engalton's Danger Sense alerts him to danger. This alarms Engalton as it has only ever happened twice before. We prepare ourselves for a tough fight.

Second Crystal: Saydar Detects Undead. There are approximately 1520 lesser undead within 600 ft. There are also 40 greater undead. There are 10 spectres travelling towards us in a group. They are about 100 ft away, towards the south, slightly underground .

Everyone triggers trollskin. Dunlan and Vychan pull the crystal free from the ground. It has taken only 10-15 seconds. We leave the area and fly to the location of the next crystal. As we fly, Sabrina and Saydar analyse the troop movements. It appears that they are starting to move into a defensive formation south of us. It will take them a couple of minutes to complete the manoeuvring.

Third Crystal: Sabrina looks out for any Darts of Seeking. She has extremely good vision and spots them hundreds of feet away. She makes herself immune to darts and steps out of the E & E counterspell. Six darts shoot towards her, hitting her chest. They fall to the ground and she steps back inside the counterspell unharmed. We remove the crystal and fly to the next one.

Fourth Crystal: Saydar steps outside the counterspell and watches for the darts. He plans to dive back inside when they get close. Vychan pulls the crystal free with his tentacles, leaving a gooey pink substance on the crystal. Saydar laughs so hard that he doesn't notice the darts until Engalton yells a warning. He dives inside the counterspell at the last minute, taking one Spec Grev to the leg as the first Dart of Seeking hits before he reaches the safety of the counterspell.

The remaining darts circle outside the counterspell waiting for a target. Engalton and Sabrina counterspell the darts and they drop to the ground. Saydar picks them up and notices the poison on the end of the darts. It looks like the two part instant death poison we met earlier. We have an antidote to the reagent and Saydar drinks it. There are three darts targetted at Saydar and at each other member of the party.

Saydar Detects Undead to keep track of the movements of the Spectres. He doubles the range on the spell and estimates that there are 2280 lesser undead and 95 greater undead within 1200 ft range. The Spectres are tracking us and slowly moving towards us underground. We fly quickly to the next crystal.

Fifth - Eleventh Crystals: We follow the same plan at each of the other crystals. Rank 20 light, E & E counterspell. Remove the Kyanite Crystal. At each location, one of the party steps outside the counterspell to attract the Dart of Seeking, diving to safety when they get close enough to see. Engalton and Sabrina counterspell the Darts and we move to the next location. We keep an eye on the troop movements and use Detect Undead to track the Spectres. Everything goes smoothly until the last remaining crystal. We know that the Spectres are waiting for us at that location. Sabrina can make herself immune to the Death Curse of the greater undead. This takes a pass action and it lasts 1 minute. She plans to do that when we arrive.

The last crystal

We cast the light and counterspells before we fly. As we approach, the light is reduced to normal conditions. We land and prepare for a tough fight.

Pulse 1 - First half: We land. Engalton's Counterspells are not in place as the spectres put down Counterspells before we arrived. The light spell is reduced to normal light by high level Darkess. We are surrounded by 10 insubstantial spectres, a number of whom have Dark Spheres. Three Death Hounds are at the head of an army of lesser undead 100Ft to the south. They are marching on our position.

We are each hit by 8 blackfires. We all resist. Morgan and Dunlan are frozen in fear. Saydar chooses to Alter Fate and barely avoids being feared once, but another blackfire causes him to flee. Dunlan uses the Favour of the Lady to give Saydar another chance and he resists the fear this time. Ajax flees in terror. A couple of arrows hit Vychan who shrugs them off. Saydar is hit by 2 disruptions which strip his fatigue. We all resist E & E magic. Dark Spheres bounce off Sabrina, Engalton and Vychan.

Sabrina jumps off Ajax and tries to rally him but fails. She pulls out her weapons and with 4 attacks she kills a spectre on the spot. She suffers a Death Curse +5 on all die rolls. This brings her total to +10. She chooses not to kill another spectre and poses heroically.

Saydar uses Arcane Power to get additional actions which he uses to Restore Fatigue. He calls on the power of Istus to Alter Fates and combine a prepare and cast of Death Blades. He kills the three Death Hounds and resists 3 Wicca spells that we guess are a weak Death Curse.

Engalton uses Arcane Power to get additional actions which he uses to dispel the Counterspell cast by the Spectres and put down his own Counterspell.

Vychan goes into a Bloodrage caused by a chaos effect from his contact with the Chaos Stone earlier. He starts flailing around with his tentacles in an attempt to kill the insubstantial spectres. He has no affect.

Dunlan and Morgan are frozen in fear. Morgan recovers but Dunlan doesn't. Liessa prepares.

Pulse 1 - second half: A wraith-like creature appears behind Vychan, backstabs him twice for substantial damage (enough to kill the most powerful human), once for an endurance blow, once for fatigue. The creature disappears before anyone can turn to get a good look at it.

Vychan swings at the insubstantial Spectres in a beserk rage. A Dark Sphere bounces off him.

Sabrina makes herself immune to Death Curse. She kills one Spectre and wounds another.

Saydar resists a Dark Sphere and summons forth 4 spectral warriors bringing the total to 5. He commands them to kill the Spectres.

Engalton raises morale and rallies Dunlan and Ajax who both recover from the fear.

The two spectres close to Morgan are preparing to cast again so he kills one of them suffering another +5 on die rolls bringing his total to +10.

Liessa casts empathy and heals Saydar of all damage.

Engalton's counterspell is not working at the end of the pulse, so his dispel did not work.

Pulse 2 - First half: The Spectral Warriors act first and kill one of the Spectres. Saydar is affected by a death curse and suffers +5 on his die rolls.

Sabrina uses her full 4 attacks this action and kills 2 more Spectres. She takes time to pose after resisting a couple of Dark Spheres. She pulls out a lantern that can dispel Dark Spheres.

We are all hit by an E & E special spell. The caster is not undead or unholy. Saydar fails to resist and is slowed. Everyone else resists. Two Spectres cast blackfire and one doubles. Saydar fails to resist the fear and is hysterical. One of the Spectral Warriors is destroyed.

Dunlan watches to see what the Spectres are doing. Liessa drinks a healing potion. Morgan snaps Saydar out of the fear with a back-hand to the jaw. Engalton uses Arcane Power to get additional actions. He dispels the Spectre's Counterpell again and puts down his own E & E counterspell.

Vychan is beserk and doing no damage to the Spectres. He decides to charge towards the incoming horde of Lesser Undead. He tramples towards a Skeletal Lord that is about 30 feet behind the front lines. About half a dozen lesser undead are destroyed as Vychan tramples over them.

Saydar snaps out of the fear and prepares to cast Death Blades.

The wraith-like being appears behind Engalton, backstabs him twice (45 EN and 42 FT) and disappears again. We get a glimpse of it. Two of the spectres sink into the earth.

Pulse 2 - Second half: Sabrina moves to kill another Spectre and starts dispelling the Dark Spheres with her lantern.

Vychan attacks the Skeletal Lord at +25 on the die rolls. He hits and a nearby skeleton explodes into dust leaving the Skeletal Lord unharmed.

Saydar casts Death Blades in an area centred on the Skeletal Lord. A 30 ft area around the Skeletal Lord bursts with flashing silver blades killing most of the lesser undead in the area (around 70 undead). Vychan has his fatigue stripped.

Dunlan prepares. Liessa and Engalton resist Dark Spheres. Liessa prepares to cast and Engalton dispels the slow on Saydar. Morgan moves into position.

Pulse 3 - First Half: We all resist E & E special. The Dark Spheres are all gone and the last Spectre has sunk into the ground.

Sabrina and Morgan wait for the wraith-like assassin to appear. Ajax returns to the party.

Dunlan casts transparency on the ground. We can see a spectre below us.

Saydar commands two of the Spectral Warriors to kill the Skeletal Lord and two of the Spectral Warriors to kill the wraith-like assassin. They charge off towards their targets.

Engalton starts to trigger a compelling obediance on Vychan.

Vychan attacks the Skeletal Lord twice. He hits, but skeletons around the Lord keep exploding and he takes little or no damage. Vychan is compelled and fails to resist.

Liessa uses Arcane Power to get additional actions. She prepares and cast, draining the WP of the Nightmare that the Skeletal Lord is riding.

The assassin appears behind Morgan who spins around and stabs him twice. The assassin appears human with a wraithcloak. He has a double bladed dagger used to deliver two part poison in each hand. He stabs Morgan and disappears.

Pulse 3 - Second Half: Sabrina mounts Ajax and charges towards the Skeletal Lord.

Engalton is affected by the two part poison which kills you outright if you cannot neutralise it within 3 actions. He uses a charge of his Amulet of Good and he is protected from the poison. He completes the trigger and Compels Vychan, overriding the previous compelling obediance cast by the enemy.

Morgan holds his action and waits for the assassin. He is tense since he knows that he was poisoned and has only one more action before he dies.

Saydar, Dunlan and Liessa prepare.

Vychan continues to attack the Skeletal Lord. One more skeleton nearby explodes, but he appears to take some damage. The two Spectral Warriors targetting the Skeletal Lord arrive and they both hit him.

And then things got dangerous ...

Pulse 4: Mist rises from the ground. Everyone resists WP drain from the horde of undead from the south, knockout gas and noxious vapours. Everyone is wracked with Agony. Sabrina is immune, Vychan fails to resist and writhes on the ground. Everyone else grits their teeth and keeps going in spite of the pain.

The Skeletal Lord vanishes along with a number of others from within the horde of undead. Sabrina notices two of the skeletons appear to be triggering a device. She jumps off Ajax, sprints over to them and destroys them both.

Morgan triggers his healing stone to try and remove the poison.

Engalton calls on the charm given to him by Fizgig (using both remaining charges) and barely manages to resist being summoned by a Greater Summoner. He spins around and stabs Morgan with Woundhealer in an attempt to cure the poison.

Dunlan, Saydar and Liessa prepare to cast magic. Vychan is ordered to return to the party and does so under the control of Engalton.

Flames erupt around the party as Hellfire impacts on each of us, six times (damage 47, 48, 43, 49, 48 and 46). Our Fire Armour is consumed by the flames. Liessa is badly burned and dies, Saydar and Dunlan fall to ground unconscious. Sabrina, Engalton and Morgan are all fairly resistant to fire and take minimal damage. Sabrina notices that the skeletons had a couple of small boxes with a lever on the top that they used to trigger the Hellfires.

The remaining 4 spectres rise out of the ground around us. They are obviously preparing magic.

At the end of the pulse we are all infused with healing from Engalton's counterspell. Dunlan and Saydar regain consciousness.

Pulse 5 - Under the affects of Agony: The cloud of flying creatures that has been circling now dive towards us and drop a number of items to the ground. These appear to be magical traps. We resist against rank 20 TK Rage five times. The front ranks of the advancing horde of undead are destroyed, clearing a wide space around us. Only 10 skeletons, 3 wights and 2 wraiths are left within 100 ft.

Sabrina resists 4 Whitefires. She charges 50ft back to the party and kills one of the spectres. She moves a few steps further and kills another spectre.

Dunlan unfurls our Banner of Command. Vychan pulls out the last Kyanite stone from the ground and puts it in our sack. Saydar orders his Spectral Warriors to kill the nearby Wraiths and starts to prepare magic again. Engalton tries to counter the Agony but fails.

The last two Spectres cast Blackfire which we all resist. Everyone makes their WP checks and nobody is affected by the fear.

With her actions in the second half of the pulse, Sabrina charges around the party and kills one of the Spectres. She moves another couple of steps and hits the last Spectre, but it does not die.

Pulse 6 - In Agony: We win the initiative, but the pain of the Agony is slowing our reactions. The cloud of flying creatures swoops down for another attack, dropping more magical traps. We are hit by 2 Windstorms and 2 more Hellfires (43 and 90 damage).

Sabrina hits the last Spectre twice and kills it. There are about 20 flying creatures, including 2 Skeletal Knights and 1 Skeletal Lord riding a nightmare. She targets the nightmare and shoots a few arrows at it. The Spectral Warriors kill two wraiths adding another +10 to Saydar's die rolls (+15 in total).

Dunlan and Saydar are both knocked unconscious by the Hellfires. Vychan shrugs it off and picks up Liessa's body. Engalton tries to counter the Agony again, but fails. Morgan prepares to cast.

Pulse 7 - Still in Agony.: We lose the initiative. Sabrina jumps on Ajax and flys up towards the cloud of creatures above us, shooting at the nightmare on the way up. Another 4 Hellfire traps are thrown to the ground by the flying troops (41, 48, 41 and 42 damage).

Dunlan and Vychan fall unconscious. Saydar is unable to resist any of the Hellfires and dies. Engalton pulls a rod forth from his belt and Teleports the entire party to safety at the top of the Temple. The teleportation is painful and Dunlan dies as we arrive.

After combat: Vychan cannot be affected by magic within the Temple grounds as he is unholy. Engalton teleports himself and Vychan to the ridge-line 1 mile away, heals Vychan and teleports back. The undead cannot reach us on the Temple, so we rest and recover.

Engalton resurrects Dunlan. He fails to resurrect Saydar, but manages on the second try. Liessa is resurrected. At least the affects of the Death Curse are removed.

Al Ambrah

On the day of the Equinox, we move to our advance camp - a cave that we hollowed out on an island about 15 miles from the ambush site. We look out through the eyes of a skeleton that we placed at the ambush location.

We know that Rashak will follow an ancient path as she goes in procession to the kingstone. Much of this path is underwater. An earth elemental tells us about the makeup of the forces as they approach the sea. Crystals of vision show that she is riding an giant undead white whale with her forces. Fighting underwater reduces our melee capabilities substantially.

The total forces we face are:

360 Skeletons
400 Zombies
20 Spectres
14 Ghouls
16 Wights
12 Wraiths
8 Skeletal Knights
2 Skeletal Lords
3 Vampires
1 Massive Flesh Golem Construct
1 Massive Bone Golem Construct

As the enemy forces reach our ambush site, Dunlan teleports us all onto the back of the whale.

Pulse 1 - First half: We land on the back of the whale. The whale is moving fast and it is hard to gain footing. We can only move slowly towards the front of the whale as the current makes it difficult.

Pulse 1 - Second half: Dunlan and Liessa prepare spells. Engalton lays down a counterspell. Vychan triggers an enhance damage counterspell. Sabrina kills a couple of the skeletons. Saydar draws on Arcane Power, preparing and casting Blades of Death in the area in front of us, destroying a number of lesser undead.

As the massive Flesh Golem turns towards us, we all resist 2xWP or are charmed by it. Morgan fails to resist, but the Luck of the Lady gives him a second chance and he resists. We all ignore the Agony in the area.

Pulse 2 - First half: Sabrina kills another couple of skeletons. Dunlan casts a light in front of us. Liessa drains the WP from a Skeletal Lord. Vychan completes the trigger of the enhance damage. Saydar draws on Arcane Power, prepares and casts Blades of Death and destroys most of the lesser undead in the area around us. Morgan advances slowly.

The enormous Flesh Golem teleports behind Sabrina and hits her twice. It hits as hard as a Titan and appears to have a Titan aura. Both of Sabrina's blood charms are consumed protecting her from the blows. While adjacent to the creature, she is affected by +25 on her die rolls. Sabrina turns to face the beast and hits it with a flurry of powerful blows. The aura protects it from 17 points of damage from each blow, making it hard to hit underwater. As she looks into its eyes, she turns to stone.

Morgan waits, hoping that the beast will turn away from him. It doesn't, so he eventually decides to move foward and attack. He hits it twice, doing two grevious injuries. It's primary arm is severed and floats past us.

Saydar continues to draw on Arcane Power and casts more Blades of Death. He eliminates a large force of lesser undead. Engalton draws on Arcane Power, preparing and casting a Spell Barrier between us and the remaining forces of undead. Liessa heals Sabrina. Vychan stares at one of the Skeletal Lords, attempting to freeze it, but the Spell Barrier prevents it from working.

Everyone uses our Melshak attacks to hit creatures that are within 30 ft. Saydar hits the Flesh Golem with his staff and withers the secondary arm. We notice that a large number of attacks against the Flesh Golem are reflected away.

Pulse 3 - First half

Dunlan and Vychan start to trigger invested items. Saydar, Morgan and Liessa prepare spells and Engalton casts a Counterspell in the area ahead of us. We notice that a number of the minions appear to be preparing spells. The Flesh Golem teleports away and appears next to Rashak.

Pulse 3 - Second half: Dunlan completes the trigger of Death Blades which wipes out a number of the lesser undead. Vychan completes the trigger of True Form and restores Sabrina to flesh. Saydar detects undead and shows that we have already killed 202 Skeletons, 336 Zombies and 6 Ghouls. Liessa attempts to drain the WP of a Skeletal Lord but the Spell Barrier prevents it. Morgan fails to cast his spell and Engalton puts down another counterspell.

We all resist 19 Blackfires and the associated fear affects. Sabrina becomes wary of the spectres and two of the rats on Saydar's Rat Cloak explode. We all resist 3 times against Mind magic and Sabrina takes some damage from a disruption. We are really happy that the spell barrier reduced the number of incoming spells by half. The entire area fills briefly with whirling flesh and the holes in the surface of whale close up. It appears that Rashak is healing all the undead golems within range.

Pulse 4 - First half: Sabrina, Saydar, Liessa and Morgan prepare to cast spells. Vychan draws on Arcane Power to prepare and cast, encasing a Skeletal Lord in a block of ice. The ice floats back towards the party, hitting Vychan and knocking him off the whale. He starts to float away. Engalton removes the Spell Barrier. Dunlan starts to trigger Death Blades.

The remaining Skeletal Lord charges foward at Morgan and the giant Skeletal Golem charges at Sabrina.

Pulse 4 - Second half: Sabrina casts Bane in the area around Rashak and the remaining undead, reducing their base chances by 40. Dunlan completes the trigger of Death Blades in the area around Rashak. Saydar casts Death Blades in the area around Rashak. Liessa drains the Skeletal Lord of 32 WP and it falls unconscious. Morgan backfires his spell and Engalton draws on Arcane Power to prepare and cast the Spell Barrier back into place. Vychan tries to dig his spear into the back of the whale to gain purchase, but instead pushes himself further away. Idiot giants with big heads and no brains!

We have reduced their numbers substantially and the combination of Spell Barrier and Bane is making it difficult for them to cast on us. We only resist a handful of Blackfires. The Skeletal Golem hits Sabrina twice for massive Titan-like blows. A blood charm aborbs one of the blows and the other strips her fatigue. The Flesh Golem teleports behind Saydar and hits him for a massive blow in the back. A blood charm absorbs the hit and Saydar ignores the creature.

Pulse 5 - First half: The Flesh Golem acts first and stabs Saydar in the back for an END hit. Another blood charm dissipates, leaving Saydar unharmed. Saydar continues to prepare, ignoring the Golem. Sabrina evades the Skeletal Golem . Dunlan and Vychan begin to trigger. Saydar and Liessa prepare spells. Engalton gets out a potion and Morgan charges the Flesh Golem again, hitting it hard which it reflects away. Saydar commands the animated arms to release the triggers on the magical traps. Two Death Blades fire in the area around Sabrina and another two around Morgan

Pulse 5 - Second half: The Flesh Golem hits Saydar again for a massive blow, enough to kill him outright. Saydar calls on the Blessing of Death and avoids the blow at the last minute. He casts Death Blades on the area around Rashak. Liessa prepares magic. Dunlan completes the trigger of Death Blades around Rashak. Vychan completes the trigger of the Teleport item and uses Arcane Power to ensure that he teleports safely back to the party. Engalton drinks his potion. Morgan hits the Flesh Golem a couple of times. Sabrina destroys 3 wights as they try to close with her. The Bone Golem is destroyed and a Spectre appears where the golem stood. The Flesh Golem teleports away next to Rashak.

Pulse 6 - First half: Sabrina kills the Spectre. Dunlan starts to trigger. Vychan starts to trigger. Saydar prepares a spell. Liessa moves adjacent to Vychan. Morgan prepares. Almost all the undead have been destroyed. Rashak, the Flesh Golem and all the spectres remain. It looks like Rashak is getting ready to leave.

Pulse 6 - Second Half: Vychan uses Arcane Power to ensure that his trigger of the teleportation works. He teleports himself, Liessa and Engalton up to the front of the whale near Rashak. Liessa uses Arcane Power to get a critical success and sticks Rashak with the Pin of Slaying Rashak. Engalton uses Arcane Power to prepare and cast a Disjunction. Sabrina moves foward and kills one of the Spectres.

Rashak and the Flesh Golem teleport away with the remaining Spectres.

We win. They lose.

Confirmed Enemies

Lesser Undead

Some carry magical traps which are small finely crafted wooden boxes. The traps have Hellfire invested at Rk 20. They target the nearest 7 living entities within range.

Flesh Golems

Destroyed 9. Constructs made from (at least) Leprechauns and Basilisks. They can teleport, fly and turn creatures to stone. They are barely sentient, but can trigger quickness. Their tactics appear to be to teleport into close combat. Their range is at least 900 feet. Upon contact in close, they explode, transfusing the blood of the victim with one part of a two-part poison. The victim is also turned to stone (no save). They have to see to target, and stepping into Rank 20 Darkness was successful in avoiding one of their attacks. The transfusion magic is mind college, the construct is necromantic magic.

Skeletal Knights

Destroyed 1 - it turned to dust that streamed towards a Cairn. Skeletons that ride Nightmares. They wear Rat Cloaks that absorb a number of magical spells cast at them. Adjacent figures have +25 on their dice rolls. They have death curses that add +5 to dice rolls of the person killing it.

Nightmares

Killed 1. Black horses with eyes of fire. The Nightmares have a racial talent of creating ash that blocks vision. It can't be dispelled. The nightmares can also enter the Astral plane at will, taking their riders with them. This makes them *very* difficult to kill since we have nothing that affects the Astral.

Lich

Killed 1. The lich was doing a ritual. It died before it could act, so we don't know what it is capable of. It has a Death Curse which adds +5 to the dice rolls of the person killing it.

Spectres

Killed 10. Each was a Dark Celestial mage. They controlled Dark Spheres and used Blackfire. Each had a Death Curse that added +5 to the dice rolls of the person killing it.

Skeletal Lord

Wear Crowns of Iron that allow any damage to be deflected to a lesser undead minion nearby.
Dark Luck gives them +20 defense. They can use up the luck until midnight and get -20 on die rolls for a pulse.
Strength Drain will drain 2 PS and 1 EN from anyone in contact with them. The stats drained will add to the stats of the Skeletal Lord
Harm Living - any living entity in an adjacent hex suffers +25 on all dice rolls.
Disenchantment - any successful strike will cause the highest rank spell on the target to be removed
Scarring Terrain - The terrain is scarred when they walk over it.

Humans

Confirmed one human assassin. Can teleport. Hits very hard and fast with high base chance. Uses blades with 2 part poison. Appeared to have a wraithcloak or similar defense spell.

Other

Confirmed one E & E mage that is not undead or unholy.

Death Hounds

Killed 3. Appear to be undead Hellhounds. Can cast disruption. Around 50 points of damage will kill them.

Wraiths

Killed 2. Can cast Whitefire. They have Death Curse +5 on die rolls.

Standing Orders:

Our first priority is keeping Engalton alive. He is always recognised and will be a high-priority target for our enemies.

When ambushed

Dunlan - Quickness on Engalton, Morgan, Sabrina, Vychan, Saydar, Dunlan, and Liessa.
Liessa - Trollskin on Saydar
Engalton - Counter Spells on the area.
Sabrina - Counter Spells on Engalton / Saydar.
Morgan - Attack.
Vychan - Trollskin on Engalton
Saydar - Cast.

Morgan and Sabrina engage in melee
Vychan is support
Saydar is blast mage
Engalton, Liessa and Dunlan keep everyone alive.