Scarlet Citadel Session 58 – Derro Defeated!

Here’s the write up from our last Scarlet Citadel session in which the adventurers dealt with Kurgorom and finally cleared Level 4 of derro.

You can read earlier posts here. This post contains spoilers for Scarlet Citadel.

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Tricksy rejoins the party as the adventurers have a short rest. 

Clairmont heads north towards the shrine of Camazotz and encounters the two surviving ghasts summoned by Gilsfeyr last session. The cleric of Khors holds them at bay while the other two clerics attack from range and Tricksy moves into melee. 

Once the ghasts were dead we stayed in initiative as the players seemed to think something else was going to happen. I didn’t disabuse them of this notion, and we ended up continuing round by round / turn by turn for quite a while as Tricksy (somewhat out of character!) very cautiously examined all the jewellery hanging from Camazotz’s statue in the sanctum and then left it where it was. The fact that there was a pentagram on the floor around the statue may have had something to do with it!

After exploring the shrine, Gilsfeyr’s chamber, and the pariah barracks, checking for traps on all the doors, Tricksy finally uses mage hand to remove a gold gorget from Camazotz’s statue and carry it over to him as he hides behind the door. Nothing happens. 

Meanwhile, Tunde and Maya keep watch on the refuse pile in the central cavern from the pariah barracks. A weird eyeball on a stalk pops up briefly from the muck before vanishing again. (I was going for a Star Wars trash compactor scene vibe here and succeeded!)

Back in the shrine, an impatient Clairmont throws caution to the wind and grabs the rest of the jewellery from the statue and stuffs it into the bag of holding. Tricksy leaps onto the statue with his boots of striding and springing and prises the gems from its eyes. 

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With the Bat Cult defeated, the characters climb the ledge to the west and enter the fungus garden. As the group moves forward, they are attacked by derro dements who shoot at them from the steps, and then retreat towards the derro village. 

Clairmont and Tricksy advance and attack Kurgorom and her allies up on the ledges, while Tunde and Maya are attacked from behind by derro in the fungus garden. When the fighting releases clouds of spores, they hasten to join the others. 

Kurgorom casts lightning bolt at Clairmont and blight at Tricksy. Clairmont responds with a fireball, then bursts into radiance, killing several derro and chupacabras.

Derro dements and chupcabras surround Clairmont and Tunde on the cavern floor; both become poisoned, allowing them to see the chamber as it once was in the ancient past. Up on the ledge, Tricksy is under attack from several foes, while Maya is being attacked on the steps by more derro.

Tricksy casts Tasha’s hideous laughter on Kurgorom, causing the witch queen to roll around on the floor in hysterics. Clairmont casts a second fireball, killing the derro witch, then the others finish off the surviving derro. They search the village, finding potions of augmented reality, a +1 shield of Vidim, and some other loot. 

Now that both derro factions have been defeated, the characters decide to take a long rest before confronting the devil Vuxarix…

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Main image by David Auden Nash