To Prove D&D Exists for Echolon

Quote from IamSposta >>

Toots will cautiously prepare to taste the liquid in the flask, but she’ll turn to Oethe and Elyona first and says: “If this turns out to be a bad idea, try to save me. There should be enough goodberries floating around the party at this point if nothing else.” At that she daubs the tiniest drop on her pinky finger and tastes the fruity yellow liquid to see if it’s some kind of potion.

 OOC: It burns! It burns! 

OOC: Nah, I'm kidding. 

The fluid is cold to the touch and tastes of grapes.

Climbing the statue is easy work with many hand and footholds. The brown gems appear to be about the size of an orange but crudely cut. Even then they could bring about 500 gp apiece.

When Tommary discards the daggers, Elyona picks them up and looks them over.  "Hmm...nothing special; still, a few extra daggers never hurt...Anyone else want one or both of them?". She frowns a bit when Tommary is caught trying to pocket the money, but laughs at the interchange between Toots and Tommary.  "Once Tommary's back on the ground, what's our next move?"

You could run away.

You could jump into the lava hole.

You could explore the outside of the mountain.

You could check out the tunnel

You could go back to Cliffside and report nothing to see.

You could take over the little town that you passed on the way to the volcano.

You could try to find out if the dragon on the map is fact or fiction.

You could....

Quote from Wysperra >>

You could run away.

You could jump into the lava hole.

You could explore the outside of the mountain.

You could check out the tunnel

You could go back to Cliffside and report nothing to see.

You could take over the little town that you passed on the way to the volcano.

You could try to find out if the dragon on the map is fact or fiction.

You could....

*OOC: Running through the list of options:

Oethe would last about twelve seconds.

Possible.

Probably a good idea.

Retirement sounds nice.

That sounds nice.

Dragons don't seem that good, but it could lead to nice retirement.

Tunnel's probably the best option.*

Tommary climbs down to decent level and vaults down the rest of the way.  Looking to the tunnel opening, he asks, "Onward?"

“Onward and downward one supposes.” Toots picks up a pebble, casts light on it, and then uses her mage hand to make the glowing stone float up ahead of the group down the cave. “Unless you’re rather go back and take over that village we passed a ways back?”

"Let's go." Oethe will create a ball of fire on the end of his mace and walk into the tunnel, staying at the back to provide light for the ranged characters and halflings, unless the group slows down enough for the small creatures to keep up.

The tunnel is rough hewn and leads down at a slight angle. There is a noticeable increase in humidity and the smell of sulfur. After about 70 feet, you see an opening lightly glowing with bioluminescent fungus. You hear loud blorps and spatters of mud.

Continuing forward the tunnel opens up to a large chamber with the bottom filled with hot boiling mud. The edges of the mud have solidified into rough cakes like puzzle pieces not quite touching. The center of the floor convects with heated mud in two places, bubbling then bursting forth with a shower of heated slime. For now the fragments of solidified muck look like they might take your weight. There are also two rock formations sticking out of the mud.

Watching the eruption of sludge takes your eyes up, and up, and you spy wooden discs hanging by chains attached to the ceiling. The discs are about 50 feet above you leading to doorways on both sides. It looks like at one time the geysers may have reached the discs, but not now.

Diagram for reference with Elyona for party location tunnel exit.

Tommary touches his sword for its opinion on where he's at.  

*OOC: so the broken patches lining the orange are arguably stable.  I'm not sure if I follow what the brown dotted path is.  

"If we got enough rope, like 150'-200' of it, with some of my pitons I think I could make a rope rail to make hugging the edge less precarious for those who are more precarious averse than me.  I'm not sure if I got any other ideas.  I've got 100' on me, 10 pitons, guess since I'd be setting it up, I could also recover it if we feel we'll need it or leave it here for our return," Tommary says with a shrug and sniffs the sulfur disapprovingly.

Your sword buzzes a warning and intensifies when the mud pots blow (The large circles). The small circles are wooden platforms with a single chain in the center anchored to the ceiling. They are 50 feet above you. The doorways are also 50 feet above you. As you toe forward, your sword has short bursts of static, like it isn't sure if the broken path is 100% safe.

"Oh dear, that is not a happy place at all. Watch your step or you'll fall in and cook us both!" Elyona's sword warns.

"...or I lead the rope up there. I got a feeling we may be able to time those mud bursts to cross those plates up there."  Tommary is feeling the wall probably frowning at its stability for climbing or belaying rope.

"My sword is not convinced those 'plates' of mud are safe.  Of course, it has been behaving like a bit of a mother hen lately.....Still, I think we are better off trying to reach those disks above us.  Getting the rope up there is beyond my abilities, but I trust Tommary can do so."

OOC: Does the sword voice have a clearly defined gender? Or a preferred pronoun? Also, lore wise, are there particular deities that would make sense for an ancients paladin in this setting?  Or should I just come up with one? 

"I'll go first, I guess. I'm mostly fireproof."

OOC: Oethe is a forge cleric, so he has fire resistance.

Tommary thinks, and says, "maybe, or maybe you can be my base to manage the rope and worst case scenario my crash pad."

*OOC What I'd like to do, or one of us to do, is climb the wall, setting up the rope in a way that will either (big ask) give advantage to the rest of the party on ascent or (smaller negotiation) minimize the DC for the rest of the party as best I can with the rope rigging.  I'm not sure how we'd want to this mechanically, but I'm thinking some mix of athletics for the climb and survival to properly rig the rope, maybe even use Oethe's assistance as help for the latter.  If someone does really want to give it a whirl, I won't protest, but I got +6 with the athletics and +8 on survival.  I suppose Nature might give a shot at surveying the feasibility of this stunt.  Also, I have feather fall primed for a reaction, but would probably need someone to catch me less I safely land in boiling mud.

OOC: Toots can give a d8 Inspiration die to whomever is going to make the initial climb.

Still OOC: But just remember the way physics works, those wooden platforms are suspended by a central chain, so if the weight on a platform shifts too far to any edge it will tip.  It might actually be safer/easier in the long run to cross this mud pit area down here and climb up on the other side so we don’t have to deal with the teeter-totters of doom that also happen to be be swinging pendulums of doom. Just sayin.’

*OOC: Physics Puzzle Party Pooper.  Not being said IC but Tommary would have never expected Toots to say "Math class is tough."  I kid.  That is a point, or rather a shifting center of gravity to consider. On the other hand I've been doing well with the Hold My Beer moments so maybe we can just gumption it.

OOC: I don’t get the math class reference. (🤷‍♂️Sorry.) And if you wanna try to gumption it be Toots’s guest, but that’s 19 times that gumption can turn to Gump real quick if you’re not careful.