Pizazz's Ravenloft and Beyond

"Meepo, hold on!  Rat triggering the trap last time send a wight at us.  And we don't know where it goes yet - at least send Rat to test it first?"

EDIT: Oh, you already did.  Well then...I don't know how else we get that stuff back.  And there'll be no talking Meepo out of going to collect the lost things.

     "I would like to collect the dragon skull," Ketch replies to Lionel.  "But what shape are we in to do more than retreat?  I for one am tapped.  Gruumsh will surely ignore me until I can again get some rest and show my devotion...  As much as we may want it, I do not think it wise to explore more than necessary."

There are three alcoves in the room you're in, and the first person to step into the farthest right one appears back in the same crypt with the two alcoves that got you in there, except that you appear in the opposite alcove in the crypt.  There does seem to be a simple two way gate.  

Meepo heads up the stairs, with his disk following behind.  Rat flies up and vanishes through the portals up top (and appears, yet again, in a dark coffin like space with a lid that he can't open).  A wight appears in his place at the top of the stairs and rushes to attack.  You all quickly destroy it. 

With all this teleporting, you can easily get separated.  At the moment, I'm going to say Mordekai found the alcove that teleports back, and is up top, on the other side of the teleportation fields...and has informed everyone how the alcoves work.  Everyone else is on the stairs, near Meepo on the other side. Rat is in a coffin somewhere. One dead wight lays here.

What now? 

((Actually both Lionel and Ketch said they are searching for the right alcove to return to the crypt))

"Let's head to the teleportation room and return to Vallaki. For there we can decide where to go."

     "Ale.  And a pillow.  Decisions tomorrow..."

(I'm going to wait for Meepo to decide if he's going to try and get his lost stuff back and chime in on heading back to Vallaki.)

Meepo follows after Mordekai, and then tries to center in on where Rat is located. He has Rat make lots of noise from inside the coffin, and walks around the area trying to listen and hear where Rat is that way.

     "I could try to sniff it off if there is anything magical upon it," Ketch says. "But I'd have to do a long, drawn out ritual to cast the spell and I don't know if the valuables are worth us spending that amount of time..."

"How long would it take? If it's going to be an hour or more, we might as well take a short rest, I'll go through the trap, grab our stuff and Dimension Door back here. But I don't feel like hiding out here for an hour is a good idea. Strahd knows where we are and knows we're weakened."

     "An hour?  No.  Not hardly... More like ten minutes or so," Ketch answers.  "And it will only work if there is something magical amongst the collection?  Still, Strahd could return at any moment... Do we wish to wait around for it?"

"If we can use that shortcut with Dimension Door - let's do it. Then we go straight to the teleporting room and back to Vallaki."

(Mordekai would be a short rest before Dimension Door. He used all of his many, many (2) spell slots fighting).

Ulthan makes sure he's akin to a sentient burr permanently attached to the one with the glowy burning vampire thing. Beyond that he just "hrmpfs" a lot, along with absentmindedly pulling on nearby leavers as he passes by them.

While Mordekai and the group has their short rest, Meepo does wander around, trying to listen for noises from Rat, but....wherever Rat is....the noise it's able to make against the stone sarcophagus isn't making it through to where Meepo can hear.  

(Short Rest achieved) 

With the bats gone, this place is much more peaceful...even restful, though the floor is still covered in guano.  You find one of the empty clean crypts to rest in and the hour passes quickly. 

Mordekai then shrugs and you all move up as he steps into the teleporting field.  He's replaced a moment later by a Wight.  Everyone's weapons are held aloft waiting for this moment though, and the wight is destroyed almost instantaneously. 

Mordekai, you appear laying on your back in a stone coffin.  Roll a Strength check to lift the lid away if you wish to. 

(( Well if we took a short rest then Ketch may as well recover some hp:  10 plus 8 ))

     Ketch listens for signs or noises from Mordekai, otherwise just stands guard...

Mordekai didn't have time to give his customary speech to the group, as he didn't want to sit around chatting.  But he knows what he would've said, and he uses that inspiration to break himself out of the coffin. (Using my inspiration to give advantage on this, as getting stuck in a coffin here really wouldn't be great!)

Strength: 14

HD: 13 12 14 

Rest helped. Somewhat. Lionel was waiting for Mordekai to finish his experiments, while watching and preparing to another inevitable fight.

((Mordekai could just be loud enough to let us know where he is...  Ketch wouldn't have rested an hour without finding him.))

(Mordekai did this AFTER the short rest....no one is sittin around leaving him stranded, fear not.)

Mordekai pushes the coffin lid up and off, sliding it to the side.  He sits up and looks around. Above him, a square shaft reaches up sixty feet to a ceiling. What looks to be a door is about fifty feet up the shaft on one side.  The bottom of the shaft opens up into a room around him which is a dank vault with a ten-foot­ high ceiling. The room is awkwardly shaped and smells of rotten meat. Fourteen other stone coffins (besides the one he's sitting in) are scattered through­ out the vault, all oriented with their heads pointed north. The floor is covered with human bones and rusty swords. As he sits there, the bones around him all begin trembling, and then slowly scraping along the floor....meeting up with others and knitting together....slowly he sees dozens and dozens of skeletons begin forming around him. 

(How are the coffins laid out?  Heads pointed north, but in a circle?  In rows?  Just randomly scattered?  How far away is the nearest other one?)