Session 296 was played on 08/17/25
Morgana, wizard 10 (Rob)
Borumar, Triton Thief 11 (Josh)
Blotto, Goblin Fighter 8 (Lanse)
Nick, Fighter 8 (Me)
Koltic, Cleric 9 (Cindy)
Aroon, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 8 (NPC)
4 Months Later…
Fully rested and recovered, the party sneaks their way into Stonehell, and makes their way carefully down to level 8, at the edge of the giant’s domain, all fully invisible. The prior encountered Stone Giants were not to be found, but a motley looking group of hill giants were on watch next to a small pond. They hear Blotto and see the light he’s carrying, even though they can’t see him. They call out to him, but he answers “Don’t worry about it” and then there’s several flashes of light and flame and a lot of screaming in pain from the giants as fireballs erupt around them. One manages to hit Morgana with a tossed rock before she uses her dagger to dispatch it. The tentacle creature in the pond is happy to take care of the bodies of the giants.
Heading into the giant’s territory they next encounter some Stone Giants, and tell them they’re off to deal with the Plated Mage. The giants wish the party luck, but seem skeptical that they’ll see them again.
Further along toward the Plated Mage’s lair, they’re accosted by a pair of demon boars, but both are quickly slaughtered before they can do much to the party. The Plated Mage’s lair lay beyond.. But first the need to get in. Of course being the Plated Mage the doors were both mechanically complex and magically reinforced. Trying to open it dispells the invisibility of those members of the party who still had it. Further investigation on the door revealed that it was in fact a false door, and feeling foolish, they move on to the next door. A little more experienced with the Plated Mage’s tricks, they manage to get this one open, revealing a long corridor, with several large bio-mechanical drones and guardian constructs, and at the far end a trio of robed engineer-mages.
Morgana barely began to try to talk to them before they attacked. A flurry of magical energy, fireballs and lightning bolts from both directions, and there’s mass casualties on both sides. The doors are slammed shut and Morgana activates her ring to zap them back to the bubble on level 6, and then to the manor.
Healing potions are purchased, and a day to recover is spent in the manor.
Teleporting back to just outside the Casino, the party returns to the Plated Mage’s door. Morgana dispells magic on it, and using a rope, it’s opened. The scars of the recent battle still mark the hall beyond, though most of the various constructs remains have been removed, though a few bits and pieces are still littering the floor. 4 new drones however are in place on guard duty and quickly move to attack the party. Morgana destroys them, and the party moves deeper, coming to another locked door. Again Dispel Magic at least temporarily opens the door, but beyond it are more of the engineer-mages who unleash fireballs at the party. Morgana’s fireballs are bigger, though Nick and Lor’Koth are happy to have fire resistant magic armor.
Pressing deeper into the Plated Mage’s lair, they find themselves in a room thrumming with a subsonic beat, pipes and wires running like bizarre rivers along the ceiling and down into strange devices. Morgana drops another Dispel Magic onto the largest of the conduits. As they’re cautiously looking around a voice calls out to them from the far end of the room. One of the engineer-mages tells them the Plated Mage wishes to speak with the party, and further violence and destruction of his property is unnecessary and unwelcome. The party accepts the truce, and they’re led to a large 2 story tall hall.
The Plated Mage is a 12’ tall construct of nightmarish appearance, and his spiderlike appearance on the upper balcony is heralded with a dry mechanical laugh and a condescending tone as he “welcomes” the party into his laboratory. He’s annoyed by the destruction they wrought and death of several of his apprentices. Morgana and the Plated Mage discuss the Triclopse Giant King. The Plated Mage reveals that the Triclopse King’s visions are clouded, but he isn’t sure by what. Morgana asks how to stop him. “Blind it and kill it.”
The party is escorted from the Plated Mage’s lab after their audience and the doors firmly closed behind them. Borumar (not Blotto!) pees on the door. He then paints a big “X” on the false door.
Off to deal with the Triclops…
Monday, January 12, 2026
Stonehell: The Plated Mage
Saturday, January 10, 2026
2025 in Miniatures
2025 was an exceedingly productive year, with 146 minis in total painted, plus a bunch of terrain! As with last year, my goal was to paint about half non-reaper minis. I hit 40% with 58 non-Reaper minis, and 88 Reaper minis. That beats last year's total, which included terrain!
It's hard to say exactly how many pieces of terrain I painted, as a good bit of it is modular.
I'm not sure what my favorite thing to work on this past year was, but the Pepto Norkers are definitely up there.
My goals going into 2025 were:
For 2026 I'm going to have some similar goals:
Friday, January 9, 2026
Rappan: Fairy Party
Session 295 was played on 08/17/25
Morgana, wizard 10 (Rob)
Borumar, Triton Thief 11 (Josh)
Blotto, Goblin Fighter 8 (Lanse)
Nick, Fighter 8 (Me)
Koltic, Cleric 9 (Cindy)
Aroon, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 8 (NPC)
The party returns to the keep to rest a couple of days. Jameth acting like Lor’koth wasn't as annoying as it could have been, but it need to be addressed. They gear up and head north, crossing the river and head deep into the woods.
The light begins to fade and the blinking of fireflies shines between the trees, giant fireflies! Light ahead brought the party to a glad full of fey, a fairy party was being set up!
The adventurers are announced and welcomed to the party. A down on his luck Puck begs Borumar to help him. He's a bad Puck and needs him to laugh at his antics to impress the Fey King and Queen. Nick spends some time flirting with a little fairy, while Blotto gets involved in the badger races.
As the night's activities begin to slow and the hour grows late, a rhythmic thrumming starts to beat from the north. Almost as one, all the fairies start to dance in time with it. Out of the darkness a huge shambling creature of bones and dirt emerges and moving with the beat. The fey dance around it while the Queen tells Morgana the beast is a guardian of a nearby ruined temple known as The Gut.
The adventures join with the fey in dancing around the guardian until it shuffles away. The music fades slightly and the fey begin to disburse, but the guardian shuffles back and using the beat’s hold on it, the party destroys it.
In thanks the Queen gifts an ointment for Jameth and gives Morgana a comb. The ointment heals Jameth’s addled mind. The party returns to the keep for more rest, and to give Morgana a chance to do some research and item creation.
Thursday, January 8, 2026
December '25 In Review
It's never not a busy month in December. Work is always crazy busy for me this time of year, and with the holidays it makes the rest of my time equally busy. The holidays themselves were relatively low key, mostly focused on keeping the kid entertained, but as exhausting as it’s been, it was great to spend time with the family, and I’m looking forward to what 2026 will bring (I say with some dread).
Gaming
The B team has dealt with the fey in Kobold Korners! Some interesting reaction rolls have resulted in the remaining fey wanting to stay and work with the kobolds, now that they are free of the fairy queen's influence. I don't know what their plan is next, but I should figure it out so I can make sure I've prepped what's needed.
I didn't get quite as far along in my session reports as I'd planned, but still made a decent dent, and should wrap up August the next time I get to sit down to write.
My work game has been on hold for the holiday season, but should be starting back up again in January with the return of a player who's missed the last 6 months!
I’ve been thinking about what I want to do gaming wise in the upcoming year, and in short I want more. I was thinking about doing one of those daily challenges, but they’re hard.
Miniatures
Coming in just at the wire I did manage to finish Valfuryx and I'm pretty happy with it! I didn't manage to finish up everything I'd planned for Q4, but I got most of it, and a solid start on everything else. 
In addition to that I've got a small pile of primed metal minis, mostly from Stargrave, that I plan on working on over the next few months.
Unplanned, but I've continued to make good progress on my Flatline City terrain. At this point I've got more than enough painted terrain to play some Stargrave! So really no excuse not to get a game in next month.
Media
Farscape season 2
Stranger Things season 5
Frosty the Snowman
Home Alone
Hacks season 2
Klaus
Miracle on 34th Street
Loot
Stars without Number and Mr Unpronounceable!
Goals for January
Play 1 game of Stargrave
Finish August & September session reports
Monday, December 22, 2025
Rappan: Worm Hunting and a new quest
Session 294 was played on 08/17/25
Morgana, wizard 10 (Rob)
Borumar, Triton Thief 11 (Josh)
Blotto, Goblin Fighter 8 (Lanse)
Nick, Fighter 8 (Me)
Koltic, Cleric 9 (Cindy)
Aroon, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 8 (NPC)
After spending some time back at the keep recovering from the fight with Sarek the Fallen, and getting the ratfolk settled in with the kobolds, the party discusses what to do next, and settles on returning to Rappan for some worm hunting. Morgana seems especially into the idea, in spite of the many powerful dangers.
The trip back down river from the keep to Zelkor’s Ferry to Sanctuary to Rappan was uneventful. Entering the dungeon was simple, as the gargoyles hadn’t returned or reformed yet. The party entered Rappan proper and made their way to the steps down to level 2 when they were stopped by a dozen plus angry giant rats. They weren’t immediately aggressive, and eventually it was figured out that they were upset that their wererat friends had been taken away, and they’d been left alone. Morgana solved this by using her teleport ritual to send them back to the manor to reunite with their friends.
Down to the worm caves was otherwise uneventful, and it wasn’t long before a great big purple worm showed up and swallowed Aroon! The resulting battle wasn’t pretty, but it got the job done, and the worm was killed, and Aroon was cut out of its belly. Within its gullet the party finds 5 large egg shaped turquoise nodules, and a 32 point star shaped glowing stone.
Deeper into the worm caverns was a large rocky outcrop.Exploring around it, they found a secret door carved into the mountain, one Morgana was looking for, but didn’t want to tell the party about in case we couldn’t find it. Through it is a set of shimmering steps. Climbing them, Jameth discovers a rune that drives him insane. He thinks he’s Lor’Koth… Honestly, it could be worse. Lor’Koth is both a good guy to have around and kinda dumb and agreeable. The Lor’Koths find it weird, but not too worrying that there seems to be 2 of them.
Beyond the secret door and the shimmering stairs is a glowing white chamber with an oversized sarcophagus. Within is a robed figure well preserved though clearly long dead. On his brow, a magical circlet, and on his arms are bracers bearing the symbol of the law. Upon a tablet attached to the sarcophagus reads:
Here lies Spiegel, Hidden in Darkness
Take up my Mantle, Take up my Legacy
Purge the Chaos in yourself
Morgana hesitates a moment before checking over the rest of the sarcophagus, and finding a secret compartment. Within is a staff, a tome, and a ring, and 4 large gems. Knowing the choice she’s making, she takes them all. She then tells the rest of the party of a temple to Orcus to the south of the mountain…
Down the magic stairs, through the secret door back out to the worm cave, and then to the far southern wall where Morgana directed the party straight to a door. On the far side Borumar could hear chanting in orcish. He opened the door, and in the brief moment before Morgana engulfed the room in a fireball 4 heavily armored orc warriors were worshiping an idol or Orcus. Through a series of hexagonal rooms beyond the now flame scarred idol room they finally come to the final room in the complex, with a pentagram inscribed on the floor, and a talking skull sitting in the middle of it.
“I am the oracle. Ask what you will”
Morgana asks the skull for the path to the temple of Orcus within Rappan, for a wish to restore Jameth’s mind, or another path to sanity.
The skull informed Morgana the price to answer her questions. 10,000gp for the temple, 1,000gp to 5,000gp for the wish, depending on the difficulty, or 500gp for an alternate path.
Morgana paid the 500gp, and the skull told her to “cross the river to the glade Fithane”
Morgana then disintegrated the skull. Nick asked her why! It was a valuable source of knowledge. Morgana pointed out that that was a problem. She didn’t want anyone using it against the party. The pentagram was then destroyed as well, before Morgana used the ritual to teleport the party home to address Jameth’s issue.
Gains: More magic items from the army of light
Kills: purple worm, orc cultists, oracle skull
Losses: Jameth’s sanity
Thursday, December 18, 2025
Rappan: Sarek the Fallen falls
Session 293 (continued) was played on 08/16/25
Morgana, wizard 10 (Rob)
Borumar, Triton Thief 11 (Josh)
Blotto, Goblin Fighter 8 (Lanse)
Nick, Fighter 8 (Me)
Koltic, Cleric 9 (Cindy)
Aroon, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 8 (NPC)
Game paused for dinner….
The party leaves the rats behind on level 1 and returns to level 2, stopping first to check out the ghoul caves. They initially were thrilled for the arrival of dinner, but Koltic disabused them of that idea, and sent their rotten souls back to whatever hell they crawled from. A few of the stronger ones, the ghasts, got away. It was decided that crawling through earthen ghoul tunnels didn’t seem the wisest of choices, so the party headed back toward Sarek’s tomb.
The golden door was again closed and locked. Morgana “knocked” it, and Aroon pushed the door open. Sarek began to repeat his monologue, while Morgana summoned a fire elemental. The meat sticks chucked vials of holy water, opting to let the elemental take the brunt of the undead lord’s cleaver of a sword. The fight was brutal, but more so for Sarek. He tried to push through the elemental, but Aroon pushed him back, even at one point throwing his sword at the death knight (?) after which Jameth stepped up to keep him from escaping the magical fire of the elemental. Morgana focused on keeping the elemental under her control, while Koltic used his faith to assist in keeping the undead monster trapped in combat.
In a flash, Sarek was finally struck down. The once mighty general of the army of light, corrupted by Orcus and forced to endure an undying misery locked in his tomb as reward was finally freed. His mortal remains fell to dust, leaving behind only his helm and sword. No longer black and corroded, but both gleaming with their hidden holy magics.
Aroon retried his sword, and then grabbed Sarek’s. “I am The Light!” It began to speak, but before it could get any further, he dropped it into a bag of holding. “Nice to meet you, we’ll get back to you in a bit.”
Beyond the entry chamber of the tomb was another chamber containing Sarek’s sarcophagus, shield, and a chest of treasure.
Gains: The Light, +2 shield, assorted coins, gems, jewelry, and some potions.
Kills: ghouls, Sarek The Fallen
Losses:
Thursday, December 11, 2025
Rappan: Running Away & Unexpected Friends
After lunch we decided to swap to the main team for some epic game play.
Session 293 was played on 08/16/25
Morgana, wizard 10 (Rob)
Borumar, Triton Thief 11 (Josh)
Blotto, Goblin Fighter 8 (Lanse)
Nick, Fighter 8 (Me)
Koltic, Cleric 9 (Cindy)
Aroon, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 8 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 8 (NPC)
The party departed Castle Black Rook, catching the ferry to Zellcors Ferry and then down towards Sanctuary on the coast. A pack of wolves stopped the party on the way, and dropped a scroll for them. Drusilla needs assistance with some missing property. She also mentions a list druidic retreat that was destroyed by barbarians. It might be a good place to expand.
In Sanctuary they picked up a few rumors
1. Be careful on the river, there's a monster
2. You can't recover spells on the lower levels
3. Great scorpions guard the tomb of the fell king
4. There's a cavern inhabited by living stairs
The party departs Sanctuary and arrives at the graveyard above Rappan. They grab the key to the mausoleum from the dwarf statue, killing the giant rats that had a burrow under/around it.
Above the mausoleum lurked 3 gargoyles who were quickly and efficiently dispatched, with 2 solid chunks of onyx claimed from their crumbling bodies.
Descending into the dungeon they explore a side passage, and use passwall to enter a blocked chamber, finding a fancy coffin within. Carefully exploring they find a scroll case and a shiny sword. Within the case was a scroll with Shield, Mirror Image, and Levitate. The coffin was destroyed.
Further exploration resulted in Jameth and Aroon getting slimed. It took a fireball to deal with the entirety of the green slime. Jameth and Aroon were toasted in the process, but not too badly. Deeper in they encounter a gelatinous cube with some small coinage within. Beyond that they found a secret door behind which they found another scroll with magic spells; Sleep, Charm Person, and Hold Person.
Finally making it to the fungal cave with the stairs down to level 2, they see a small campfire at the far end, and a bit of movement. “Leave us alone” a sad sounding female voice calls out. As it was at the far end, away from both the steps and the way out, and there wasn’t obviously a large group, they continued on their way, giving the voice its wish.
At the bottom of the stairs a troop of orcs was waiting, most in plate mail! A quick and brutal fight, and the orcs were laid low, stripped of their valuables, and bodies left to rot. The party continued around to the golden door, and began investigating how to remove it from the frame. Borumar unlocked the door, missing the poison needle trap, but the trap failed to hurt him. Beyond the door, once opened, was a charred chamber, and standing in the middle a skeletal figure in a heavy black crown with a large bastard sword.
“I am Sarak. I have fallen. Prepare to die.” The skeletal figure warned. Sarak’s mere presence was enough to break Nick, Morgana, Jameth, and Aroon and they all ran from the room. Sarak steps forward, sword lashing out and cutting hard into Borumar who finds himself nearly alone. Blotto and Lor’Koth leap to defend Borumar, and all three hit the skeletal figure back, but it just laughs, and heals itself, before lashing out at Borumar again, dropping him. Lor’Koth and Blotto grab their friend and book it.
The party rallies at the base of the stairs, and attempts to make another assault on Sarak. Morgana throws a lightning bolt through the door at the first sight of the skeletal form, but it just shrugs it off as if it was a static shock. It marches toward the party.
The party runs away back to the fungal cave not stopping till they reach the top of the stairs.
“I told you to leave us alone!” The female voice from before, this time more angry yells, and follows that up with a volley of Magic Missiles. Morgana returns the favor, and the young woman drops like a rock. Going over the small stream, and through the various large and medium fungal growths to the body. Numerous rats of various sizes hiss but back away as the party approaches. She’s small, maybe a bit malnourished, and wearing a mismatched set of scrounged up dirty clothing. Her magic wand is taken before she’s given a healing potion and touched by Koltic’s staff to revive her.
She relates a story of another group of adventurers who invaded the dungeon, and indiscriminately dropped a fireball on her wererat mate Jarvix and her family. Her name is Fillaar, and she’s still in mourning from the assault some 6 months back. In an offer of friendship Morgana offers to see what she can do for her mate. Squeezing through some too tight tunnels, she’s brought to the body… what’s left of it after 6 months, and as she already had it memorized, casts Resurrection on it, and manages to bring him back in his original form!
The rats and wererats reward the party with 2 sacks of sneezing and choking, a helm of read magic, boots of elven kind, and a small bag of gold.