Unlikely Heroes: That's Enough Zombies, Thank You

Game Date: 3/3/2012
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Derp DuDerp (Cliff): Half-Elf Bard
Flora Oakwillow (Matt): Hamadryad Seeker
Keyanna (Chere): Half-Elf Sorcerer
Marrick (Greg): Dwarf Knight
Nementah (Ted):  Wilden Druid
Starr (Star): Eladrin Paladin

The Session:
Last session ended with a horde of undead swarming the walls of Falcon's Hollow.  Our heroes managed to defeat the first wave of zombies before ending the session.  Today we jumped right into the action, standing outside the city walls, ready to take on the next part of the mob.

The second wave was mostly normal zombies, and a couple of ghouls.  We had a fair number of lumberjacks helping us, but they were fragile and easily defeated.  Still, they managed to hold off one group of zombies while we took care of the other, preventing us from getting too overwhelmed.  Nevertheless, it was a difficult battle.

Flora uses a daily that creates a zone of difficult terrain.

No sooner had we finished off the second wave, when the third wave approached.  This time there were three groups, and a few more lumberjacks joined us.  Once again, the lumberjack held off one group, while we handled another.  The third group was too far away for us to prevent from getting into the city.  Some of the group the lumberjacks were fighting also managed to climb over the town walls.

Keyanna fumbles a spell, creating a superzombie.

The final wave consisted only of zombie minions, but there were tons of them.  Even more managed to get past us into town, and Nementah was nearly killed by the swarm.  It took a while, but we finally wiped out the zombies outside, and we took a well-deserved rest by the gate.

This party needs more AOE spells.

Counting all the waves together, it was probably the longest D&D encounter I've been in.  We didn't get to take any rests between waves.  I think the scariest part of the battle was not the zombies themselves, but when the DM - who put these encounters together - asked us, "You guys are level 6, right?"  (We're level 4.)  Of course, he might have been joking... maybe?

The forces inside the gates had managed to take care of the undead that had breached the walls.  The sheriff, the cleric, and Payday (no, this isn't the setup to a bad joke) came outside to thank us.  They told us that they didn't recognize these zombies (that is, they didn't look like any dead people they had known when alive), and we agreed to check out the local cemetery.  But first we took an overnight rest at our keep, and replenished our supply of healing potions.

The next morning we set out for the cemetery, guided by Verrin, the graveyard's caretaker.  As we reached Verrin's cabin, he noticed that his door was open. Marrick stepped up to check it out.  He entered the dark room and was attacked by... a raccoon, which he deftly grabbed and tossed out of the cabin.  Verrin then broke down in tears (he'd lost his mule during the zombie attacks).  We checked out the graveyard itself.

There were about twenty open graves, not nearly enough to account for the swarms we'd fought the night before.  We looked closely at the zombie tracks, and saw something interesting.  Most of the tracks came from farther away, passing through the cemetery and proceeding to town.  However, the tracks that originated from this graveyard did not head to town, and went North instead. 

We followed the zombie tracks, into a part of the forest that made Flora nervous.  The party came across a few animals that looked like they'd been killed by ghouls.  Finally we realized that the tracks were headed towards the Dwarven Monastery our original party had explored all those sessions ago.  As we reached the monastery, we noticed a wolf staring at us.  We started to ignore it and head on in, when the wolf asked us to stop.  We don't see a lot of talking wolves, so we listened to what it had to say.

He said his name was Lucimar, and that he was a friend of the Druid that used to watch this area.  He warned us that a great evil had been awakened in the bowels of the monastery. Of course, that just made us want to in go in more.  Marrick asked the wolf to watch over Verrin for us, and we proceeded into the monastery.  We followed the zombie tracks until we reached a large hole.

Derp used his Boots of Climbing to go down the hole.  He was soon startled when some eyes opened up on the walls.  Then he saw movement in the water below.  As the party began climbing (and sometimes falling) down into the hole, we found ourselves fighting three tentacles sticking out of the water.

I've seen enough hentai to know where this is going.

Nementah was grabbed and gnawed on a little, taking the most damage this battle.  Finally we killed the last one, and took a short rest in the adjoining hallway.  And that's where we ended the session.

Afterthoughts:
This was my first time playing a Seeker.  I've read that the class sucks, and nothing I've seen so far really changes that perception.  At first glance Flora looks like a Striker who can't do much damage, but really she's a Controller who can't control anything.  She's not tough at all, so I have to play her a little bit cowardly just to stay on my feet.  I don't like that, but I can't help the party at all if I'm dead.

But despite her mechanical shortcomings, I really like this character.  She has a lot of interesting flavor.  With Dalia (my last character), I wrote a fair-sized backstory and never really touched on any of it during the game.  Meanwhile, Flora has a paper-thin backstory, and one look tells you everything you need to know about her. And yet, Flora feels deeper than Dalia, because her details fit into the story better.