Castle of the Mad Archmage Session 6

Castle of the Mad Archmage Session #6 recap:

Current Party:
Hask (1/2 Orc FTR 3/ PAL 1) - played by me
Ankar (1/2 Orc SRC 4) - played by Ian
Einar (Dwarf CLR 4) - played by Dave
Santiago (Halfling ROG 4) - played by Dustin
Go'ram(??? ALC 4) - played by Richard
New Guy (Dwarf DRD 3/MNK 1) - played by Rob
Skarsnik (1/2 Orc FTR 4) - played by Jake - new player


This week we didn't actually head into the CotMA. Instead we were approached by the town's cleric, Scarlett. She asked us to send a representative to a secret meeting. We elected to send our Dwarven Cleric, as it was a religious invitation. Through the next couple of days, he and the DM texted the meeting, which included the Pints 'o Pain (the adventure group we attacked in our last outing of the dungeon) and the wizard (sorcerer?) who almost killed us in our first incursion.

Through negotiation, our Cleric did an awesome job of getting us paid: 3500 gp to investigate a "temple," 250 gp per cultist, and 2k dead or 3k alive for a cleric we were familiar with, Abigail. She had traveled with us from Hommlet to Greyhawk as a guard of the caravan that we hired on to.

We headed out after dark, based on directions from Scarlett. Finding the temple was no problem, and a storm even rolled in to cover our noise! Luck seemed to be with us. We spotted a light patrolling the area, and engaged 4 followers of Demogorgon! I have to say, Channel Energy (Negative) really hurts. We survived, and took minor injuries.

Moving around to the back of the temple, we found two entrances. We sent in Santiago, invisible to scout the area. He returned telling us of a long hallway with 10 (?) doors and another corridor leading to a temple with a Demogorgon statue. The group quietly entered the outer door, and began systematically checking the doors. All of them were empty save for a desk, and perfectly made bunk beds. We checked the second corridor and found that a couple of those rooms were used, but unoccupied. Then we heard a scream.

The Paladin ran towards the woman's scream, ignoring a pair of double doors, which Santiago glued with a tanglefoot bag. Approaching the screams Hask saw 2 ogre sized "bleeding" skeletons, which he ignored when he saw the clerics dragging a maiden.

Three more clerics of Demogorgon engaged with the skeletons on the party. Skarsnik, Go'ram, and the Druid, dealt with the skeletons, while Hask, Santiago (with a Pro Evil from Einar), and Ankar moved to deal with the clerics.

In the middle of this hard combat, 3 more clerics broke out of the tanglefooted door. We did eventually take them out. But we were bloodied when done. However, we did save the maiden!

Between the 2 Ogre-Blood-Zombies were another set of doors. We healed some and headed in, to find 4 more OBZs and Abigail. She gave a fairly typical bad guy speech and the fight was joined. Hask got dropped by a zombie, and Abigail fled through a "door." Skarsnik played cleanup on the zombies while Ankar, Einar and Santiago chased her through the illusion.

She tried to escape through an outer door. Santiago blocked the escape.  Meanwhile, Hask came to, stood up, and was dropped by the same zombie taking an AOO. Another fight ensues with Abigail, while Hask is brought to consciousness again. Abigail is close to defeated, when Menkel (the Inquisitor) shows up and kills Santiago. They dimdoor to escape, and the session ends.

A problem

I wanted to do my bi-weekly write up of Castle of the Mad Archmage, but instead I need to talk about party strife. We had a player quit in the campaign over the weekend. Because initiative got screwed up for 1 round. Well, that was his excuse anyway.

Now, he is a friend, and a longtime gamer in many of our campaigns. But, this is not the first time this has happened. I'm tempted to tell the DM he cannot come back to the campaign (it is run at my house.) This could break a friendship. I don't know that it will, as he is currently in the XCrawl game that runs on the alternate Saturdays.

Currently the policy is he is welcome back as long as we don't fill his slot. Which we are not actively trying to do.

Has anyone experienced this, and how did you handle it? Anyone have any blogs you have read on the subject that could help?

I finally figured out Raise Dead in Mord Mar

I have been thinking for a while about the ability to Raise Dead characters. It has always seemed too simple of a task. I have decided that only a cleric of a god the dead character follows can Raise or Res the dead character.

It seems like a good solution. It doesn't tax any resources over the normal amount. It expands role playing possibilities. Anybody try this before?