D&D Stupidity: Week Three, in which the party are maimed horrifically and we witness the remarkable return of Bob

Y'know, there's a reason D&D players are funny about their dice. Three out of our four players (and the DM) have their own set, me included, except that now Garry (Carric) and Cameron (Larrsinan) are seriously considering changing theirs after the horrific amount of bad rolling last night. The god of dice rolls was apparently very unhappy with us.

So uh... expect lots of instances of the party failing horribly. Thankfully we have a nice DM, who I may or may not have bribed with the promise of discount beer in order to get a reroll at one point. We were also down a paladin and our wizard was in the hands of someone else due to there being a stupid amount of snow for this early in the year and their players being unable to get to my flat. But anyway, let's get cracking, shall we?

Last week we left off with the party regrouping oustside the waterfall entrance to the kobolds' cave lair. Everyone was rather excited about this, since once they cleared this out, there would be no more bloody kobolds to fight. Lucifer, we have to assume for the sake of the blog, was so excited that he passed out or something. After listening to the gang inside the cave talking about whatever kobolds talk about in their spare time, Larrsinan (henceforth referred to as Larrs for brevity) and Carric sat and had a brief argument as to what sort of approach they should take, eventually deciding that a full frontal assault would be quicker and easier. And so, yelling like idiots, onward they charged, with the two magic users following at a safe distance. The kobolds were indeed rather surprised.

Pausing to briefly analyse the enemy, there were rather mixed reactions. Carric had a nervous breakdown, Illyria was pretty much indifferent and Larrs seemed rather happy about the situation. Damakos just sort of stood there staring at the ceiling, until Carric snapped, rushed forward and sort of... flailed... at two of the kobolds, somehow managing to kill one in the process. And then everything started going straight to hell.

Illyria got off to a bad start by being stabbed in the leg, while Carric, Swiftpaw and Damakos also obtained stab wounds. In retaliation, Damakos roasted three of them. Carric, apparently startled by the sudden bright light and heat, was then stabbed twice more. Illyria, highly unimpressed, exloded her attacker with Dire Radiance, because concentrated and very painful starlight is the best punishment, while Larrs got in a good solid thwack on one of the tougher ones that was menacing Damakos.

Carric then made a brief recovery, killing two of the things in rapid succession and beating another round the head. Distracted by the kung fu, Illyria was stabbed in the leg again while two more kobolds sailed past Swiftpaw as they tried to attack her. Damakos threw another one of his by now trademark fireballs, hitting one of the tougher kobolds, dodging a spear, and getting another one in the ribs anyway. Carric was then stabbed repeatedly, catapulting him straight back into the gibbering mess he was at the start of the battle, while Illyria fried one of the kobolds attacking him. Larrs then just succeeded in landing a blow on another one, and Carric frantically healed himself before launching himself at one of them, missing, then punching straight through another's chest, missing another one, and then smacking the first one that he missed on the follow-through.

Illyria was attacked again, being grazed by another spear which made her rather... unhappy. And so the unlucky kobold found her sucking out part of his life force and healing herself a little in the process. In the background, Larrs failed to hit anything.

Just when it was starting to look like the end of the battle was nigh, a horn sounded at the back of the cavern, exciting the remaining kobolds. A few more of them trickled out of various places in the cave, as well as an old, battle-scarred goblin armed with a big battle axe that had seen a lot of use. He was not a friendly looking guy, probably due to the ram skull and wolfskin adornments. Carric freaked out upon seeing him, although this did lead to him mangling a kobold.

Then it got worse.

Damakos and Illyria got some solid hits in against a few of the mooks, although Illyria's target managed to get her with his spear before he was seared to death. Thinking that she was being injured entirely too much, Illyria proceeded to move herself, going invisible in the process. A kobold spellcaster who had snuck out of the back of the cave attempted to throw some acid at Larrs, but thankfully failed. Larrs, apparently hyped up on adrenalin or something, made the stupid mistake of trying to taunt the goblin. This ended up amounting to him pulling silly faces at it and the goblin looking severely unimpressed. Then, in a smarter move, he moved Carric around so that they could coordinate attacks against the thing. This did, unfortunately, end up failing.

Then, in the midst of his nervous gibberings, Carric pulled off a bit of kung fu that was so epic that he beat the shit out of two kobolds without touching them. And then he got hit with the goblin's battle axe. In order to try and help even the odds, Damakos tried a Ray of Enfeeblement on the goblin warrior, failing, but hitting one of the kobolds hard with a scorching burst. Illyria, now frustrated and rather sore, levelled her Flames of Phlegethos spell at the goblin, taking a massive chunk out of him and setting him on enchanted fire. Then another ball of acid flew past Larrs' head while Swiftpaw sunk her teeth into the goblin's achilles' tendon. In response, it smacked her and her master around with its axe, while its kobold flunkies severely stabbed Larrs twice.

Larrs managed to land a solid blow on the goblin and get the party some hit points in the process. Carric then rolled up his sleevs and prepared to kick some ass. And then didn't.

Illyria was attacked again, but avoided any serious injury. Carric, on the other hand, took a heavy blow and Damakos levelled another scorching burst, followed up with Illyria killing the unfortunate target with a magic missile.

The kobold mage aimed for Larrs again and missed, presumably because it was not very bright and was just sort of standing there drooling and waving its staff around in case it actually hit anything. Larrs ignored it and made to attack the goblin again. He failed. So did Carric.

And then, to the sound of a cheering studio audience (sound effects provided by flatmate Claire), Bob reappeared to save the day. Bob may have been slightly drunk at the time and hoping that the cave was another pub, but since the party was dying horribly, they didn't really care.

Damakos, in celebration, hit the kobold mage with a fireball to the gut, while Illyria blasted the goblin and the pulled her invisibilty trick. And then the moronic scaled mage actually managed to hit Larrs with his next ball of acid, although this didn't stop him from hitting the goblin.

Bob then set a dude on fire in epic fashion. Isn't Bob awesome?

Carric failed to land another blow and his fox took a severe wallop to the face and fell unconcscious while Damakos launched a magic missile at the goblin and Illyria failed to connect with her eldritch blast. Larrs then took another glob of acid to the face and subsequently missed everything. So did Carric, who was then rendered unconscious.

Damakos landed another magic missile, Illyria missed again, and the Larrs was hit with even more acid and joined Carric on the floor of the cave. Things did not look good.

And then Bob swept in in magnificent fashion and cleaved the kobold mage in twain with a holy strike while Larrs and Carric struggled and failed to get back to their feet and failed to manage it. The fox, however, got back on her feet. The goblin, now unconcerned with the prone figures, moved to attack Bob, landing a blow on him. It was then killed with a magic missile to the back of the head, courtesy of Damakos.

While Larrs and Carric gingerly picked themselves up, Illyria took the liberty of going over the body of the goblin, finding a small silver key and a message scroll. The message was not good news for the party, as it informed them that someone was apparently rather close to opening up that rift hidden in the old keep in the hills.

However, the mood was improved somewhat by the big chest full of gold and a suit of magic chainmail that was opened by the key.

Three guesses who wasn't allowed to get her hands on any of it.