Ninth meeting

9/10/2024 Ninth Leap
 
We get to adventure again!!! As I, Naldon was studying my spell book for the day, Lars, Skullgrin, Eolas, and Ragnarock found a secret doorway next to the Ogre's lair, and surprise! (not) we found some more hobgoblins. Lars reacts amazingly fast, marks 1 hobgoblin with his Hunter’s Mark ability, and then completely misses that hobgoblin with his longbow. I target the same one and also MISS with the spell Scorching Ray, it has 3 beams and I completely missed! Ragnarock starts Yelling at Skullgrin “You Call That Diplomacy? I Will show you Diplomacy” and Screaming “Diplomacy” as runs and attacks with his greataxe, but he fails to hit and then Skullgrin swings with his Maul, and doesn’t do any damage to his target that is standing in front of him.
Eolas is able to cast Bless on Skullgrin, Ragnarock, and Lars. The hobgoblins get a chance to retaliate and have a 50% success rate 2 hits from 2 hobgoblins, and Ragnarock takes 9 damage. Thankfully Eolas is wearing good armor and it blocks the longsword attack against him. Lars has his pseudodragon companion move to attack which is successful, though not very damaging, but right after his Longbow sings and Slams an arrow into the hobgoblin next to Ragnarock, doing 9 damage. I target the far hobgoblin that has moved toward Ragnarock, and damage it with Magic Missile for 4 points.
Eolas casts Spiritual Weapon and the form it takes today is a Large, Leather-bound Tome. This Spiritual Weapon attacks the hobgoblin next to him doing 7 damage, and disabusing its notion of an easy to hurt cleric, Eolas has a few spikes of protection. Ragnarock is in trouble because he is facing 2 hobgoblins, and both succeed to hit him, and one those 2 is better trained as it is able to strike a weak spot on Ragnarock’s armor and hit with 12 damage, dropping him to very few Life points remaining.
Lars and his pseudodragon Alencia, (yes Lars has a pseudodragon animal companion, the lucky, pointy eared, crazy ranger, where was I?) Oh yes, Lars and Alencia have Ragnarock’s back and together remove both hobgoblin attackers, Alencia with another great bite, and Lars with a Very Well shot arrow. This removal of opponents allows Ragnarock to throw a dagger into Skullgrin’s dance partner causing 4 damage, and then drink his healing potion. Skullgrin attacks his target twice more but misses with both strikes, and Eolas still has a problem that another casting of Spiritual Weapon solves nicely.
 
The last hobgoblin drops his weapon and stops fighting us by stepping back. Ragnarock tries to intimidate the last guard but it is already scared, but Lars succeeds to persuade it to talk to us. We ask it where the children and missing people from above to which he responds “I don’t know, I am just a guard. Go through the doors over there to see Kazmojen.” Ragnarock and Skullgrin didn’t like that option, stripped the hobgoblin out of his chain mail and tied its arms behind his back. We will march the hobgoblin guard with us so it can’t sound an alarm or ambush ahead of us. The NW doors behind the hobgoblin have a Very large and heavy bar blocking them from opening, so we can only go through the SW gate doors.
Very quickly we see more 2 Hobgoblins, and they hammer on the door they are guarding, yelling something I don’t hear clearly, but Eolas understands and tells us these guards are yelling “Intruders”. The hobgoblins turn and try shooting at us with longbows, and they both miss, 1 trying to hit Skullgrin and the prisoner but failing, and the other sending his arrow straight between Skullgrin and Ragnarock, missing Eolas and Lars and hitting the stone wall near me. Yay, more enemies.
 
Lars attacks the door guards with his longbow, but misses, and Ragnarock fires his longbow also and hits the left guard doing 10 damage. Our prisoner tries to get away from Skullgrin and doesn’t succeed, as Skullgrin throws a hand axe down the hallway, but the axe hits the wall behind the west door guard. The guards attack again with their longbows, and fail to hit us. And Skullgrin smacks the prisoner’s head against the wall to stun it which stops him from causing us problems for a bit. I target the guard Ragnarock hit, and damage it with a Fire Bolt for 7 damage, which kills that guard. 4 MORE Hobgoblin guards enter this hallway from an East-side cross hallway, and join the fray, and they have kite shields. Eolas moves toward a West hallway branch, and cast Sacred Flame, but the new guard from the east branch is able to resist the spell. One of the new guards runs down the hall toward the longbow guards, and one moved to attack Lar’s pseudodragon Alencia hitting it for 8 damage. Lars retaliates and the arrow glances off because the new guards’ armor is stronger than the flunkies we have picked on already. The pseudodragon Alencia also attacks and bites its attacker for 5 damage.
Ragnarock runs to the East side of the corridor to engage the new guards there, attacks with his greataxe, and is not able to hit as these hobgoblins are better armored AND trained. The guard counters Ragnarock and hits doing 7 damage. Skullgrin releases his grip on the tied-up hobgoblin, and runs over to help Ragnarock, but his maul doesn’t connect at all. The guard counters attacks, And completely misses Skullgrin. I draw my longbow string back to my cheek and let my arrow fly at the longbow guard, and hit him with 3 damage. Eolas runs over to Ragnarock also, cast Shield of Faith to give Ragnarock some AC bonus, and attempts to slap that guard but fails. The prisoner takes his chance and Flees the hallway, sprinting all the way out through the secret door we found earlier.
The Longbow guard moves to the west wall and pulls a lever or handle, and a Pit with spikes opens in the floor right next to Skullgrin. The farthest back of the new guards throws his javelin at Eolas and strikes him for 2 damage, and then picks up the dead guards’ longbow and arrows. The middle guard attacks the pseudodragon Alencia and completely misses the swiftly flying companion. Lars and his Alencia both counter attack but do not succeed either. Ragnarock attacks his opponent but doesn’t hit, then Skullgrin attacks again with his large maul, and Smashes his target hobgoblin on the left side of its armor visibly crushing 4 or 5 ribs. The hobgoblin sways on its feet, and then tries to push/drag Skullgrin to the pit beside them, but Skullgrin Easily takes his maul and shoves the guard back into the side hallway away from himself.
Eolas casts Guiding Bolt using a 2nd Level Spell slot, and Vaporizes the longbow guard at the back wall, causing 22 damage. The spell appears as a Large Tome opening up and rays of light Stab into and through the hobgoblin, picking it up and slamming him into the far wall. As that body slowly slides down the wall when the spell ends, there is an outline of the guard left behind on the wall. The guard that picked up the longbow saw the damage that Eolas did, and fired at him doing 4 damage, causing Eolas to stop concentrating on Shield of Faith. Ragnarock attacks the 4th guard to his left, misses with his first swipe, but is able bring his greataxe back around and do 11 damage to the guard, hitting its neck and killing that one. Skullgrin attacks his enemy, crushing its skull and finishing the threat from him. Skullgrin then runs back from the pit and leaps across to get in range to engage the last two guards.
The shield guard that picked up the bow decides to bull rush Skullgrin and successfully shoves him into the pit even with Skullgrin’s last second try to dodge, causing 10 damage to Skullgrin from the drop and the spikes at the bottom of the pit. The hobgoblin that has been attacking Alencia has the same Idea about the pseudodragon, BUT he has Already forgotten just how agile pseudodraagons are, and he fails completely as Alencia bites the back of its neck apart, destroying the spine of this poor, less than brilliant hobgoblin. Its last moments are on the cold stone floor trying to stay alive, but without his neck it is not to be. Ragnarock throws one hand axe across the pit at the last living guard and hits the left shoulder causing 4 damage.
Naldon fires his Longbow at the last guard, gets a critical hit at the base of the hobgoblin’s skull and as it looks at the arrow, a drop of blood drips out, and then it slowly tips forward into the pit, On TOP of Skullgrin. All we hear is more swearing from Skullgrin as the dead hobgoblin bleeds out upon him.
Eolas is able to pull out his rope and drop it down to Skullgrin to get him out of the pit quickly before he takes any more damage down there. We now regroup and take stock and account of the fighting.
The 5 of us today have defeated 10 hobgoblins, 1 of whom ran very quickly away, we have gathered multiple sets of armor (mostly chain mail), some shields, longswords (1 of which I claim), 2 longbows across the pit by the far doors, arrows over there also, and a few javelins.