Opening the chest with the proper key, rather than picking or forcing the lock, would open it without summoning the Earth Elemental. Alternately higher level magic like Dispel Magic or Antimagic Field, things the party does not have access to, could do it. It is likely the key was taken by the priest who corrupted this place, Greedyguts.
This is based on the excellent check results of the earlier check made with the Help action.
(( When/if we get to the door... Galheon listens...hopefully with assistance...and I assume Evan does too ))
22 + Guidance (if available): 1
From behind the door you make out a voice that sounds like it is echoing from some place below, evidently in the midst of a sermon based on its cadence, a call and response met only by guttural gurgling sounds from the “congregation.”
“And the gods of healing, when they restore life to a lifeless body, what do they ask? A diamond, one worth one thousand pieces of gold! Always that! Not a certain size of diamond, no. One with certain value. Whether the market is flush with diamonds or they are rare, that is the price of a life - a diamond worth one thousand pieces of gold! Yes, my children - even the gods are capitalists! You can put a price on life! If the root value of all is the gold standard then even the gods worship at the alter of gold! How truly divine then are we that The Keeper has granted us unending life through that most holy of substances, gold itself! Praise The Keeper! Praise the gold! Long live the Glitterdoom!”
“And the gods of healing, when they restore life to a lifeless body, what do they ask? A diamond, one worth one thousand pieces of gold! Always that! Not a certain size of diamond, no. One with certain value. Whether the market is flush with diamonds or they are rare, that is the price of a life - a diamond worth one thousand pieces of gold! Yes, my children - even the gods are capitalists! You can put a price on life! If the root value of all is the gold standard then even the gods worship at the alter of gold! How truly divine then are we that The Keeper has granted us unending life through that most holy of substances, gold itself! Praise The Keeper! Praise the gold! Long live the Glitterdoom!”
[OOC: Love the meta references to the game itself.]
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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Tyrus Mountson: Lvl 3 Dwarvish Bard; Waterdeep Campaign (Dragon Heist) Nanoc the Younger: Semi-retired Lvl 2 Rogue / Level 2 Barbarian Human; The Knuckle, Mror Holds, Ebberon. The Honourable Jaden Fellan: Level 3 Human Eldritch Knight; Band of Sunswall
AKA: Phillip Berrie: writer, editor and academic thrillseeker—a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
A tremen- dous derrick and winch dominate this large, 20’ high-ceilinged chamber. Suspended from the derrick is a huge iron bucket measuring 20’ in diameter. A section of the bucket’s side is hinged and stands open, allowing easy entrance and egress. Beneath the dangling bucket is an open shaft some 25’ wide. A slight draught blows from the hole, carrying with it the mephitic smell of miner- als and the subterranean world. The sound of the ongoing sermon is coming directly from below, now audible to all of you.
“They do not care about the size of the diamond - the gods are not alchemists! They are merchants, traders, all based on the value set in gold! Some of you carry a fragment of a life’s value in you now, my Greed Grubs, my Stone Ghosts, loyal acolytes of Glittergloom. But the greatest of you truly earns the price of eternal life! One thousand pieces of gold worth of the holy aurum within your own body! The Great Wyrm of Greed moves in the mines below us, devouring morsel after morsel of gold from the earth, until it attains true perfection! Praise the Keeper that our lives were prolonged to see this miraculous being come into the world!”
Both Evan and Terevan come to the realization that what animated these creatures is not traditional necromancy, but a perversion of actual resurrection Magics, twisted through the dark curse of the Glittergloom.
[Definitely out of character for Nanoc: The Derrick is obviously used to raise and lower the huge bucket up and down this hole, which suggests to me that it might be rigged to free fall onto the assembled nasties below taking out a lot of them in the process. And doing so won't necessarily prevent us from getting down into the mine as we now know of a secret shaft that will give us access to the mine... Okkar might not like us wrecking the derrick, but it seems to me that we now have the deadline of the 'miraculous being' coming to life to beat.]
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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Tyrus Mountson: Lvl 3 Dwarvish Bard; Waterdeep Campaign (Dragon Heist) Nanoc the Younger: Semi-retired Lvl 2 Rogue / Level 2 Barbarian Human; The Knuckle, Mror Holds, Ebberon. The Honourable Jaden Fellan: Level 3 Human Eldritch Knight; Band of Sunswall
AKA: Phillip Berrie: writer, editor and academic thrillseeker—a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
[Definitely out of character for Nanoc: The Derrick is obviously used to raise and lower the huge bucket up and down this hole, which suggests to me that it might be rigged to free fall onto the assembled nasties below taking out a lot of them in the process. And doing so won't necessarily prevent us from getting down into the mine as we now know of a secret shaft that will give us access to the mine... Okkar might not like us wrecking the derrick, but it seems to me that we now have the deadline of the 'miraculous being' coming to life to beat.]
On considering this:
As Nanoc has a passive Perception of 12 or better, while examining the entrance to the mine using his goggles of night, he notices the wooden supports around the adit donappear old and precarious. The supports are AC 10 and have 15 hp and no particular resistances. With a proper application of engineering - a DC 10 Int check - it could in fact be destroyed in such a way as to trigger a larger cave in directly above these Glitterdoom worshipers. Doing so would destroy this main entrance to the mine, which would be a setback for future workers, but might be worth it in thinning out the herd below, if not killing them outright.
Woukd this mean we would be unable to descend to the bodies? Ie total collapse?
A success with intent to cause a cave in of that magnitude would, yes. It is a trade off, and still not guaranteed to end the threat entirely, and it does make it more difficult to Go down to confirm - although the group did find the odd alternate entrance in the mess hall.
OOC: Do we know how many creatures are listening to the sermon? I'm thinking I cast Shatter to get as many as possible. Not sure if they will get disadvantage on their saves. At least just to get things started??
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(( Any sense of how to deactivate it? ))
Opening the chest with the proper key, rather than picking or forcing the lock, would open it without summoning the Earth Elemental. Alternately higher level magic like Dispel Magic or Antimagic Field, things the party does not have access to, could do it. It is likely the key was taken by the priest who corrupted this place, Greedyguts.
This is based on the excellent check results of the earlier check made with the Help action.
Galtheon grunts, "I think this'll keep."
(( ooc: if my map is correct...we only have one unexplored area now...no other doors in this room? ))
He looks around the room and then nods to himself, "Let's backtrack to the big double-doors."
Suggested position:
That is correct - there is one more area to explore.
"Yes. Let's leave this here for now. We do not want to let something like that out right now."
(( When/if we get to the door... Galheon listens...hopefully with assistance...and I assume Evan does too ))
25 + Guidance (if available): 3
From behind the door you make out a voice that sounds like it is echoing from some place below, evidently in the midst of a sermon based on its cadence, a call and response met only by guttural gurgling sounds from the “congregation.”
“And the gods of healing, when they restore life to a lifeless body, what do they ask? A diamond, one worth one thousand pieces of gold! Always that! Not a certain size of diamond, no. One with certain value. Whether the market is flush with diamonds or they are rare, that is the price of a life - a diamond worth one thousand pieces of gold! Yes, my children - even the gods are capitalists! You can put a price on life! If the root value of all is the gold standard then even the gods worship at the alter of gold! How truly divine then are we that The Keeper has granted us unending life through that most holy of substances, gold itself! Praise The Keeper! Praise the gold! Long live the Glitterdoom!”
(( ooc: lolol ))
[OOC: Love the meta references to the game itself.]
---
Tyrus Mountson: Lvl 3 Dwarvish Bard; Waterdeep Campaign (Dragon Heist)
Nanoc the Younger: Semi-retired Lvl 2 Rogue / Level 2 Barbarian Human; The Knuckle, Mror Holds, Ebberon.
The Honourable Jaden Fellan: Level 3 Human Eldritch Knight; Band of Sunswall
AKA: Phillip Berrie: writer, editor and academic thrillseeker—a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
OOC: The module doesn’t give this guy any dialogue or characterization - I couldn’t resist.
(( I guess we can open the door, and freeze-frame if we need to ))
A tremen- dous derrick and winch dominate this large, 20’ high-ceilinged chamber. Suspended from the derrick is a huge iron bucket measuring 20’ in diameter. A section of the bucket’s side is hinged and stands open, allowing easy entrance and egress. Beneath the dangling bucket is an open shaft some 25’ wide. A slight draught blows from the hole, carrying with it the mephitic smell of miner- als and the subterranean world.
The sound of the ongoing sermon is coming directly from below, now audible to all of you.
“They do not care about the size of the diamond - the gods are not alchemists! They are merchants, traders, all based on the value set in gold! Some of you carry a fragment of a life’s value in you now, my Greed Grubs, my Stone Ghosts, loyal acolytes of Glittergloom. But the greatest of you truly earns the price of eternal life! One thousand pieces of gold worth of the holy aurum within your own body! The Great Wyrm of Greed moves in the mines below us, devouring morsel after morsel of gold from the earth, until it attains true perfection! Praise the Keeper that our lives were prolonged to see this miraculous being come into the world!”
Both Evan and Terevan come to the realization that what animated these creatures is not traditional necromancy, but a perversion of actual resurrection Magics, twisted through the dark curse of the Glittergloom.
[Definitely out of character for Nanoc: The Derrick is obviously used to raise and lower the huge bucket up and down this hole, which suggests to me that it might be rigged to free fall onto the assembled nasties below taking out a lot of them in the process. And doing so won't necessarily prevent us from getting down into the mine as we now know of a secret shaft that will give us access to the mine... Okkar might not like us wrecking the derrick, but it seems to me that we now have the deadline of the 'miraculous being' coming to life to beat.]
---
Tyrus Mountson: Lvl 3 Dwarvish Bard; Waterdeep Campaign (Dragon Heist)
Nanoc the Younger: Semi-retired Lvl 2 Rogue / Level 2 Barbarian Human; The Knuckle, Mror Holds, Ebberon.
The Honourable Jaden Fellan: Level 3 Human Eldritch Knight; Band of Sunswall
AKA: Phillip Berrie: writer, editor and academic thrillseeker—a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
On considering this:
As Nanoc has a passive Perception of 12 or better, while examining the entrance to the mine using his goggles of night, he notices the wooden supports around the adit donappear old and precarious.
The supports are AC 10 and have 15 hp and no particular resistances. With a proper application of engineering - a DC 10 Int check - it could in fact be destroyed in such a way as to trigger a larger cave in directly above these Glitterdoom worshipers. Doing so would destroy this main entrance to the mine, which would be a setback for future workers, but might be worth it in thinning out the herd below, if not killing them outright.
(( ooc: Woukd this mean we would be unable to descend to the bodies? Ie total collapse? ))
A success with intent to cause a cave in of that magnitude would, yes. It is a trade off, and still not guaranteed to end the threat entirely, and it does make it more difficult to Go down to confirm - although the group did find the odd alternate entrance in the mess hall.
(( ooc: Id say last resort ))
Let me know how the group decides to proceed. I probably won’t be able to respond to whatever it is until tomorrow by my time.
“One way or another, this is it,” Okkar says grimly.
OOC: Do we know how many creatures are listening to the sermon? I'm thinking I cast Shatter to get as many as possible. Not sure if they will get disadvantage on their saves. At least just to get things started??