Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#24) - The Isle of the Abbey V

Thursday's gaming session was a relatively short one as we managed to complete this particular campaign section. If our rolls weren't so dire in all of the other encounters prior to this session we would have got here much sooner. I have never known so many sub-5 rolls (and more 1's than pretty much anything else) in a campaign. These dire rolls meant that not only did encounters take probably three to four times as long to play out than they should have done, but we went through all of our spell slots, and had several character KO's in each session meaning we had to take so many long rests to recover. I am dreading the next part of the campaign as, apparently, the danger level ramps up for us. TPK in the first session?

Day 52 - continued

The two figures within the heat-hazed room looked like they were made of iron; a smooth round ball of a head upon broad, squat shoulders. These beings were not tall but were powerfully built. The addition of a sword and hammer in place of arms and hands made for awe inspiring enemies.

Most of us still carried injuries from the previous encounters, and we were pretty much depleted magic-wise prior to this encounter, but Gladreth, Dharion and I still, thankfully, had one or two spells left each.

The fighters stormed straight into the room and attacked the metal beings but were sorely pressed and often knocked prone due to the strength of the metal constructs. The rest of us piled on missile pressure from our bows and slings, taking small chunks out of their iron hides. The fighters hacked away and also caused many great clefts in the statues' metal skins.

On one occasion, one broke through the ring of fighters and got to the second rank where it proceeded to spin its top half to great effect; the sword and hammer causing great damage to those unlucky enough to be caught by them. A Prayer of Healing restored most of us to full health but the battle raged on.

At one point I yelled out to Gladreth to use her Magic Missiles. She cast the spell within the next few moments and the first of the constructs, the one that had begun the spinning attack, finally fell with a loud clang.

A short while later, Gladreth spotted that the second iron golem had just run its top half into a spin whilst fighting Druss and Drakkon. Thinking that it too must be close to being destroyed, she cast her final Magic Missile spell and that one also fell to the floor with a clang.

Not knowing what dangers were still lurking, Dharion and I used our last spells to heal some of those most sorely injured, whilst Navda tested all of the chests and boxes for traps. After the healing was completed and all the chests were checked, we opened them to reveal a great hoard of treasures, that included gold coins, gems, jewellery, potions, fine armour, bolts of fine silk and a wondrous Bag of Holding.

The Abbey Dungeon in full

Not knowing how much more of this dungeon lay ahead of us, we traced our steps back towards the main entrance via the northern corridor. We discovered several more traps, but this time no-one succumbed to them. We had finally searched the entire maze and rid it of all dangers.

A few days later we returned to town and claimed our 2000 Gold Crown reward from the Mariners Guild. They were happy with the job we had done and set out straight away to begin building a new lighthouse and fortress on the island.

We hung around the town's taverns and inns telling our tales of daring and generally relaxing after all the troubles we had been through. We gathered though that it would not be long before we were called upon again to rid the town of some new danger.