Anauroch - The Great Desert

[Brainpiercing]

The hammer hit the back of the demon with a dry thud... but didn't so much as make a dent.

[Omen of Peace]

Mael decomposes visibly when the fleeing demons warn everyone against him.
Oh, no... If they band up I'm toast.

What happens instead is that the blind demon turns his terrible power on all of them. The inoffensive halfling is overwhelmed, his whip falling from limp hands.

[OOC]

No natural 20, so failed Fort save.

DC 28!? That puts their combined Con score and HD at 46. For instance Con 28 and 18 HD... It's not a slog, it's "we're going to die if we don't make them flee." I.e. an "interesting" fight.

[Private for BP]

Azur cursed at the new turn of event. The screech only reached him weakened and devoid of its magical power on the Ethereal, but it was doing a number on the spellcasters - and on Mael. He moved on to the next Vrock, praying that he would have better luck. Not that his god and master cared about such little endeavours, but it couldn't hurt.

[OOC]
Move adjacent to Vrock3, Possession (Will save DC 26, -2 penalty if it's Evil, etc...).

[Thistledown Thurbertaut]

Seeing that it's attacks were not penetrating the foul demon's hide but that in turn, the creature's own attacks were  quickly rending through even it's adamantine shell, the Marc realized a change in tactics was in order.  It could take at least one of these creatures out of the fight but first it wanted to soften the creature up a little, as it had the bullette-chimera.

Holding up a hand, several pellets shot forth and impacted on the squaking Vrok, exploding in a cone of gas.

Fort Save: 37

Weakening Breath, DC 32 Fort save please. Fail= -6 str penalty for 4 rounds, success = same for only 2 rounds.

[Brainpiercing]

[PRIVATE for Mael]

[Vrock 3s save: 24.
That was actually the one you shouldn't have taken, since it wasn't even shaken, but... ]

The demon tried to resist Azur's advances, but the defences of his mind and body were penetrated. It's newly grown demonic heart froze in fear with the icy clutch of the devil...

[MARCV]

Please make an AoO on Vrock 1, before it screams. I've decided that it should move about a bit incoherently in circles before triggering the scream.

I'm taking the weakening gas as your Round 9 action.
In any case: Vrock's fort: 23.

[ooc]

I've PMed raith0, it seems he was online two or three days ago... I'll still try his fort save for him, so we can move to round 9 (eventually ).
Fort: 24

Now the only one missing is Daelric, I think.

Doyle could not resist the stunning power of the scream. He dropped his sword again and stood around, swaying lightly...

[Omen of Peace]

[Private for BP]

Azur had targeted his current victim in full knowledge that it was less vulnerable, but the third vrock was currently blind and thus a flawed vessel.

A new thought-voice resonated inside the demon's skull: "kneel, spawn of the Abyss, or you will be knelt".

[Brainpiercing]

[PRIVATE for Mael]

[ooc]Ok, so... unfortunately he will then have to broadcast his reply, since he doesn't perceive the origin of the words.

A haughty demonic laugh reverberated in everyone's mind.
Spawn of the Abyss we were, but servants we are no longer. We will not kneel, and if we are destroyed, Mother will avenge us, just as we shall avenge our brethren.[/spoiler]

[Omen of Peace]

[Private for BP]

[OOC]
Small correction: the possessed is not aware that he is possessed.
"If the saving throw is failed, the creature is possessed, though it is not necessarily aware of this fact."
As far as the vrock is concerned, it could be any of his enemies that spoke to him...

[Brainpiercing]

[PRIVATE for Mael]

[ooc]Ok, sorry, I thought Azur had made the demon aware of himself to show his superiority. But... you didn't actually say that. Well... I'll have to edit that reply, but I have to think of something non-metagamey now... and request your patience until tomorrow. .

[Snizor]

OOC:

Saves:
Fort 9
Ref: 18, 15 (no natural 20s in the batch)

The piercing screech of the blinded demon caused Daelric to double over, unable to act even as the flames spewed from the other demon caused his exposed flesh to blacken.

[Brainpiercing]

ooc

Yeah, sorry, if you hadn't moved, you would not be stunned now. I actually counted on at least a few of you making that save...

Which reminds me: Did Torgthen make it?

Cat had hesitated beneath the corpse of the Chimera, waiting for an order from his master. But now his master was staggering about, obviously knocked out by the terrible scream - and in direct vicinity of the demon. Cat felt very little desire to sacrifice his own life to save his master's, but fact of the matter was, he needed him - and he doubted he would become too friendly with the others present, OR with the demons.

So there was nothing he could do. Like a dark streak he shot towards the Demon, leaping into the air before hitting. A draconic maw full of teeth met him on the way, but it was ill-aimed and he passed it by. And then he struck against the demon's chest. His right claw made contact with the ridiculously tough hide and actually managed to cut - but then it just passed through the flesh, which closed right after it. And no other claw or tooth managed to hold. With a frustrated snarl, Cat dropped to the ground underneath the demon.


Round 9

The MARC's pellets hit the Vrock, encompassing it with a cloud of weakening gas, and the Vrock felt his Strength drained yet more.

[Brainpiercing]

[ooc]

By the way: Everyone who got stunned after acting in Round 8 doesn't get their Round 9 action. Everyone who hasn't yet acted in Round 8 gets their Round 9 action after the demons.

And someone should save Daelric. If Vrock 3 gets to act this round he's dead, since probably noone has 1000gp in Diamond Dust handy (and if Devanar had some it was stolen by the Bugbears, earlier).

[Omen of Peace]

[Private for BP]

Azur tightens his grip on what passes for the demon's soul.

[OOC]
Will save DC 24 with a -2 penalty (due to a -4 penalty to Wisdom from Ally or Enemy) for Control Creature. If Azur succeeds, he chooses to make the Vrock's "spirit" black out rather than remain aware.
Give me a Will save DC 26 with a -2 penalty if Azur succeeds, as he will try to read the vrock's memories.

Either way: "Each round of struggle, the victim can take only a single move or attack action."
I just noticed that, funnily enough, RAW this precludes using breath weapons or SLAs. I won't hold it against you if you change it to "move or standard".
Hopefully Daelric won't die in one hit.

[Thistledown Thurbertaut]

Seeing it's companions falling one by one to the horrible demons, Marc changes tactics, hoping to save the dangerous threatened Daelric from death.  Expanding outward as he did against the rubble-monster in the underground keep, the enlarged war-golem blasts full-tilt into the Vrock about to extinguish the human and its cat.

Standard action: Construct Shape into Gargantuan size.  Move action: charge-bull-rush into Vrock 3.  After any AoO, go ahead and contest a Bullrush Strength check of 43...

Next round I'll use Tempest breath and then either keep doing so or I can grapple one of them out of the fight.

[Brainpiercing]

[MARCV]

1st: This would have to be your Round 10 action - I think you might have a move action left in round 9.

2nd, do you have an ability that lets you bullrush or anything other as a move action?

[PRIVATE for Mael]

Will: 18
Will No. 2: 23

[Thistledown Thurbertaut]

You can bull rush as part of a charge, which is by definition a move action, allowing you to move up to double your regular movement allowance and make a single attack at the end.

[Omen of Peace]

[Private for BP]

The demon had inadvertently given Azur the kind of lead he was hoping for. After fully taking over the pitiful creature's body and neatly tucking its consciousness aside so that it would never know what had happened to it, Azur began to dissect its memories, following the trail of "Mother". The notion was so charged both emotionally and rationally that he was assailed by countless images.
He had the benefit of the mindspace's time: exploring the memories could seem to take hours when mere seconds had actually passed in the outside world. This was the basis of what some people called the Other Memory.

He paid particular attention to information regarding "Mother"'s motives, her turns of sentence, her current location.

[OOC]
I leave up to you how much he can learn while searching through the memories (which is a free action). His round is not over: he'll talk to the other demons afterwards.

[Brainpiercing]

[PRIVATE for Mael]

The demon didn't even manage a mental yelp as Azur blotted out its consciousness, and dove into its memories - which, even for a devil, must have been disconcerting. Where in hell, everything was ordered, in the abyss, everything was chaos. Where in hell there was a plan in torture and death, in the abyss there was an abundance of senseless violence. Demons against demons, Demons against devils (in the war), demons against everything else that lived, or even against non-living objects.  A mere whim could cause death of another, or of oneself. And where in hell there were cities of devils, the demons summarily lived in muck.

If Azur had imagined that he would have to go back to the demon's memories of birthing to find the ominous 'Mother', then he would find he was wrong - the advent of a demon into the world began with raging pain, fear and hate (mostly of other demons, they simply didn't give a crap about anything else), and it just went downhill from there. There was nothing motherly, no warming force of a hearth to be found there.

Mother first appeared in the demon's thoughts a few days ago. When his scouting party had suddenly found that some of their number had grown strange, additional heads, that spawned new thoughts, and above all, made them HUNGRY and TIRED. Azur was probably a good deal more familiar with those notions, since he had been among humans more. It was this sensation that the demons could simply not comprehend - they did not know how to sleep, and the impulse to eat was likewise just not there. But along with these problems, there was a new thought - one that united the changed demons. It was immediately obvious to all due to the telepathic links between them - there was a promise. One of unity, to replace the eternal solitude, solace to replace despair, even a promise of warmth, the abstract notion of the hearth-fire, to replace that cold place in a demon's mind that drove each of them on. But it was all very diffuse. The single unifying word was that of 'Mother', which had spawned in its mind at some time - apparently randomly. They did not, in fact, know who or what Mother was, just that she, or it - even the sex wasn't clearly defined in the demon's mind; Mother denoted female, but that was a speech thing - existed as a notion of an entity that had birthed them, in their new form. And with it came the realisation that they were indeed now different than the other demons, and hence should bond together - an entirely alien notion to a demon, normally. Admittedly, all of this had formed gradually over the past few days, and indeed there had been a good amount of internal bickering - even among the individual heads of one newly created chimeric demon. But they had arrived a certain conclusion, and that was - for demons, and for their prospective victims - quite a scary thing.

So they had - with great effifacy and speed - killed off those of their unit that were not changed, and had set out to find mother, while avoiding the other demons. They had merely stumbled upon the other battle, and had taken it upon themselves to save another one of Mother's children - unsuccessfully, so now they thirsted for vengeance.

[Omen of Peace]

[Private for BP]

The churning psyche feels strange and unstable, but Azur knows to ride it with a firm hand, imposing structure upon the chaos. Even in the Abyss, time has some meaning after all, even when space might not. And if events unfold in a certain order, there has to be traces of the flight of the arrow of time in the memories.

Just as he taught Mael much, he learned from the halfling in turn, from his trials, his errors, his at-time surprising insights into the mortal condition. It would help here. The immortal demons had tasted of mortality's bitter waters. So much was unknown to these lost lambs who wore the clothes of wolves, a gaping hole Azur could step into.

"Brothers!" the Vrock's voice came, to everyone's ears and into everyone's heads. "I am led to... reconsider. I sense... kinship in these frail creatures. Mother knows best! Her touch is on them. Tiny touch, but it'll grow. It'll grow heads!
They shouldn't have killed our beastly kin, no, no, no.

But the ring'a'ring'o'roses? No, no, neither.

Mother! Let the strife end! We're coming to you!"

[OOC]

The speech comes from Vrock3. He 5ft-steps away from Daelric, towards the north.
Bluff 31, Diplomacy 36 - the latter is not meant to change anyone's attitude (yet?) so I assume making the check as a free action as part of speaking is ok.

[Brainpiercing]

[ooc]

Will the MARC do anything else after changing size? He can't bull-rush as a move action, but he could use his move for something else.

The other two demons stopped in mid movement, and hesitated.
What are you saying? the blinded one asked telepathically, while his heads were mumbling among each other. Have these become Mother's children, too? Then why did they kill our beastly kin? And why can't I feel it?

Aye, why can't we both feel it? the other said. At least the dwarf and the machine must die. We can examine the others, later.

Both demons half-turned to their compatriot, but they nevertheless stayed ready - any hostile actions were to be met with deadly force.

They both ready breath weapons against a hostile action, but otherwise wait for more explanations.

Unfortunately the two Babaus who had been befuddled by Daelric were not capable of following the conversation in their current state of mind. One of them began grinning stupidly and drooling, and then spat a line of acid at Daelric. [1d100=7; 8 damage, Ref DC 24 half.]
The other went on babbling incoherently. [1d100=46]

[Omen of Peace]

"The process has just begun" the Vrock thinks back, but he is including everyone in the scene unlike his brethren. "They are not kin just now. But soon. I sense. Cannot explain how or why.

Mother is right. Our lesser kin" he has to mean the babaus (or the chimeras ?) "we must protect. Go against this future-kin and more will die. We must endure. Herd the babbling child away."

The bird-like demon then speaks out loud: "Withdraw there, or be undone. You can't even scratch us." He points at the far side of the tent.