Note from Dan: Game 64 was mostly a fight. Generally, if Dave is out I try to fill in, but since it was all fighting nothing of note happened. We didn't even finish the fight. Ended the night at round 6.
We leveled up to 12th. The wizard and the monk were missing and the warlock was late. However, when the paladin arrived, we began in the middle of the fight. Loki rolled high on initiative and went first. He fired at the most wounded vampire but missed twice. Evidently, she was the one with the highest AC. He then moved to one of the alcoves with a coffin, figuring that might be important. Kharn grabbed that Morning Lord idol which gave many protection from evil. Stradanya avoid that and Ambrus’s sunlight sword and attacked Loki in the shadows. She hit, grabbed, bit, and drained and like that, he went from unharmed to half-dead. Ambrus bravely ran across the room to help him, bringing his sunlight aura with him. However, she used a legendary action to grab him, no to hit or save needed, and flung him across the room. She also summoned her animated armor which didn’t have much of an impact.
Ezra hit a vampire with a radiant smite but she had a magic mask that made her immune from radiant for a round. The Warlock showed up and lit up his Symbol of the Raven Queen which was another sunlight radius that covered half the room. He also brought back his Gust which caused some difficulties for both sides. Loki managed to wiggle free and get over to the daylight and the Paladin. The NPC did her sword dance spell thing and finished off a vampire. We saw the mist go into one of the coffins. Stradanya cast baleful polymorph on Ambrus and turned him into a cat. This at least dropped her Web spell that athletics and acrobatics less DQ was hopelessly stuck in. And then used her extra actions to move through the walls and back over to Loki. Luckily, she missed this time because she was disadvantaged by the protection from evil but then realized she was in the daylight. She took damage on her actual turn and pooched her concentration and like that, Ambrus was not a cat any more.
Around here, Rahadan appeared from the Ethereal Plane and attacked Kharn. He did an auto-crit sneak attack for 74 points. Luckily, Kharn saved against the poison or it could have been more. He got 3 more attacks but those were just 1d8+. In fact, he never did another sneak attack so didn’t impact much after that first strike. He drew a lot of fire and got beat up pretty good. He Misty Stepped into an alcove and disappeared. And then her Nightmare horse appeared. It didn’t have much of an impact either but it got in the way. Same with the rat swarms. As usual, we were spending all our resources on her minions but weren’t doing much of anything to her. But the sunlight was keeping her away so it was just ranged spells. Another vampire fell from the persistent daylight damage. The NPC cast Haste and then unleashed her high-level sunburst on the vampire (and some of us) however Stradanya used a legendary action and absorbed it. Not sure what that did for her but at the very least, it was countered.
On her next action, Esmerelda cast Mass Polymorph from a scroll and turned all the PCs (and herself) into T. Rexes. We were given the chance to save against it but only DQ tried (and failed). Everyone was one hit from out so they took the hit points over the class powers. That was a nightmare in FGs to get that cast but eventually Brian sorted it out. It was crowded to say the least. But it became a matter of rulings. Are polymorphed T Rexes magic attacks? Brian said yes or else it was useless. Paul was worried about his last rage carrying over and initially, Brian said yes. However, that opened a can of worms. Mobility carries over? Sentinel? Blind Fight? Eventually, he declared none of that carried over but the rage counter was put on pause. But most importantly, he said that DQ’s sunlight from his holy symbol did carry over which made some sense. As did the protection from evil from the idol. The sun sword sunlight also carried over which made less sense.
So, with that all sorted out, we got going again. She was attacked but only one at a time due to spacing. Rahadan was found near her. The nightmare was attacked as well. Loki remembered last time when she used it to escape to the Ethereal Plane. The armor and the swarms were attacked but more to use up the tail attacks. Somewhere in there, the last vampire went down and back into the coffin. Rahadan realized that the NPC was the key and came into the room to attack her 4 times. I think he hit every time (T Rex AC is low) but she made every concentration save. He was finally finished off by her. It might have been more satisfying if it was Ambrus that killed him (dark elf slayer) or at least a PC but he was finally dead. T. Loki grabbed a coffin, carried it into the daylight, and crunched it open. That vampire within was reduced to ash. Others followed suit with the others and T. Ezra destroyed her coffin. She ran towards her horse and it ran to her. Once together, she stepped into the Ethereal Plane with it and was gone again.
At this point, it was almost 1 AM. We agreed to storyboard one more round to clear out the remaining minions. Brian stated that Stradanya would be returning shortly. Otherwise, we could spend two more game sessions chasing her around the castle. Or Barovia. This will be her final stand. Whether (or when) we should revert from T Rexes will be discussed. And whether she’ll wait for us to revert. I think most of us are below half or worse and many resources have been spent fighting minions. By design, I suppose. Whether we can beat her, all versus one, with what is left is still debatable. Some of us will go down, that’s for sure. Brian also stated that this is the real deal and not the trial run. Win or lose, no one wants to redo all this. He also bumped us up to 13th we were supposed to be when we fought her for the last time. That’ll get access to a new high-level spell for the casters including the ranger and paladin. Next game in two weeks without Paul.
