(This was submitted by a group of gaming fans of our site who go by The Zoo. Thanks guys!)
Continuing from where mrevand6 left off from the giant demon turnip, the soulknife ran ahead and was promptly swallowed, ne’er to return. My cleric of JUSTICE AND VALOUR watched in mute horror as his comrade was devoured by this foul creature, and recompense for his life was demanded.
I drew my blade and said “Now we shall slay this fiend and avenge the life of our comrade!”.
My fellow cleric stated, “We need to run.”
The local bandito said “Naw.”
And the warlock simply looked on.
This turned into a 5 minute break, where we reconnoitered outside to plan/argue, as we were wont to.
Now, as you faithful readers may know, our DM was not the best one our group had played with. He railroaded like a fiend, refused to do his bookwork, and had a very rigid idea of how D&D was “supposed” to be like. To wit, my cleric had turned into a plot device, and I endured it with grace and serenity borne of patience (until he broke my master’s sword, but that is a rage story not fit for here).
Outside, I repeated my demand that we do battle in the name of our fallen friend and scrub this blight from the land! The other cleric, a weak, weedy fellow of perhaps questionable faith, again repeated that we could not win, we were exhausted from many battles up to this point, including a very bad run-in with 2 shambling mounds (we will never look down on plant monsters ever again), and I challenged his courage and made a discouraging remark about his testicles or lack thereoff (or something of the sort).
The bandito said it wasn’t his problem (it’s never his problem until shambling mounds show up ::grumble::) and the warlock continued to look.
I repeated that we will fight this beast or I will stand alone to fell it.
What I did not say was that due to my armor and the presentation I saw before, of the soulknife, the single fastest thing I had ever seen getting snapped up mid-run by this burrowing monster, I could not under any means functionally outrun it, and I could not fly. I literally had no choice but to stand and fight, or die fleeing.
The cleric finally relented, saying he had some ideas left, and with him, the bandito grudgingly agreed. With the majority rules, the warlock followed suit. I bounded back into the house, sat at the table, looked over my charater sheet, took stock of my spells, and waited.
What I didn’t know was that the rest of the group was still plotting outside…
Everyone comes back in, and sits down. The first thing the cleric does is cast the spell needed to give you wings on himself, then offers to hit me with it. I defer to giving it to the bandito, as he had some decent ranged ability (that never worked [OHHH NOOO~]), and the warlock again takes to the air.
I then sorta realized just how buggered I was.
Well, hell. I hit myself with some buffs, hulk the hell up, summoned 5 celestial badgers (love these guys, 1d4+1 baby), spread them out in a circle, and had them rage, stamping their feet to draw in the turnip.
It burrowed down, and the DM rolled a d6 to determine who got nommed. A badger got hit (thankfully), the group made some cursory attempts to pelt it from the air, while I activated my plan. I walked over to it, and grappled the damn thing, with all the badgers assisting. I proceed to then pin the creature, my grapple check sky high with the buff bonuses, keep it down for its round, release my part of the grapple, quick draw my longsword with both hands, and full bore power attack it.
Rolled to hit, rolled damage.
“30 damage,” I say, “is it dead?”.
“No”, replies the DM.
Rolled again, hit again, 36 damage, still alive. Quick Strike bracers, go. Attack again, hit again. “40 damage, is it dead?”.
“Yes, it’s dead…”.
“Good”.
I de-summon the badgers and sheath my sword as my comrades float down from the skies. I cut open the beast with my knife, hoping to recover my comrade’s remains for burial, and am told there is nothing inside, not even his metal/magic gear.
Taking this situation in silent stride, I quietly build a small shrine and pray for his soul to find salvation before looking towards a small hut that contained a gnawed upon corpse, the corpse’s journal detailing the creation of the monstrous plant we had slain and a few small baubles.
We burned the creature’s body, burned the ashes, then I called down divine fire to burn them once more just in case.
With the situation solved, we returned to the tree people, told them the creature that was killing their folk was dealt with, received their word they would leave the human settlements be, then got on our damn ship and left that accursed island behind.
This was about the time I came to realize that 3.5 D&D clerics are sorta busted.
