*** Session 13 - Scene 7 (of 9) ***

The entrance to the great labyrinth is a secret door hidden in one of the many alleyways in the Great Suq. The stairs are very long and the labyrinth appears to be deep underground.

Gra'bir takes the lead, with M'Balz following behind holding the lamp for light. Butrus takes the rear guard position.

At the end of the stairs, the hallway continues for a short way before curving to the right. At the point of the curve is an idol of an efreeti with ruby eyes, staring at them.

Gra'bir suggests plucking out the ruby eyes, but M'Balz is more careful. He approaches the statue carefully, noticing the way the light reflects off the eyes they are more likely colored glass than gemstones.

M'Balz proceeds with approaching the statue and pops out the eyes. He puts them in his pack, calling them a "rich reward" (likely planning to use them to bilk his companions out of their share of treasure later).

After spending some more time looking around the statue and finding nothing of interest, they decide to move on.

The passage goes only a short ways before turning the right again. After another short distance, a side passage off to the right is found. Shining the light in, the side passage appears to almost immediately curve left and run parallel to the hallway they are already in.

After much consideration, the group eventually decides to proceed forward in the current hall. However, after only a short distance is traveled, the path ends in a dead end. Butrus searches around for traps or secret doors, but discovers nothing.

They then turn around and follow the other path. It goes down a ways then turns right. As they continue to follow the hall, they see it has a side passage to the right but also curves right shortly after.

Again, they decide to stay on the main path. Around the curve, the hall continues for a short way before turning left, then shortly turning right again. After a short distance, the hall ends with a door on the left wall of the hall.

Gra'bir listens at the door, but hears nothing beyond. He finds, however, the door is locked. Butrus moves up to pick the lock.

Opening the door, Gra'bir sees it is a medium-sized room. Across the room are a couple of doors on the opposite wall. The room appears to be large enough the lamp does not illuminate the whole room.

Everyone heads inside the room and immediately "fall" to the ceiling, as the gravity in the room is reversed. Gra'bir gets injured in the fall, while Butrus and M'Balz manage to land on their feet.

Now inside, they also spot another door along the same wall as they entered in the far corner of the room.

M'Balz grabs some pebbles on the ceiling as part of a plan to avoid further surprises. They then make their way over to the door in the corner after the three split up to listen at each, with no one hearing anything.

After having some trouble opening the door upside down, M'Balz manages to get it open. He throws some pebbles inside, seeing the gravity is back to normal.

He hops down and shines his light around; the room appears to be large and filled with empty bookshelves.

The room also has another door on the same wall next to the door M'Balz entered from. As the others come into the room, they look around more and discover another door along the opposite wall in the corner. Just to be safe, the group searches the room but finds nothing.

Butrus listens at the far door and hears nothing. He finds it is unlocked. Looking inside briefly, he sees the hall beyond immediately turns left. He closes the door.

Gra'bir then heads over to the other door. Beyond, he hears a light whistling of wind. That door too appears to be unlocked.

Opening the door, Gra'bir smells the air beyond is musty. The passage beyond immediately curves right.

The group decides to head down the musty hallway. After some time, it curves left then shortly turns left again.

As Gra'bir rounds the second left, a net drops down. M'Balz and Butrus manage to step back to avoid it but their companion is entangled.

Butrus looks around carefully to see if there are any other traps, but before he can look for too long a creature emerges from the other direction. They can see it is a large, primitive ogre – known as an ogrima.

The ogrima carries a large club but ignores M'Balz and Butrus. Instead, it grabs the entangled Gra'bir and starts dragging him back.

While M'Balz grabs on and tries to cut the net with his dagger, Butrus calls out for him to stop and talk to them.

The ogrima ignores Butrus but sighs when he sees M'Balz trying to cut the net. He drops the net and smashes out with his club, but the rogue slips out of the way.

M'Balz manages to get the net cut open and Butrus helps widen it. Gra'bir gets himself free. With the quarters too tight for his lance, Gra'bir readies his sword.

Moving in, Gra'bir slashes into the beast. M'Balz tries to maneuver his way behind the creature, but fails. Butrus smashes the orgima's knee with his mace.

The ogrima attacks back at Butrus, narrowly grazing him with his club. A second swing misses.

Gra'bir stabs into the creature, running him through with his scimitar. Pulling the sword out, guts spew everywhere.

*** Session 13 - Scene 8 (of 9) ***

With the ogrima dead, Butrus finds he has 8 gold in his pocket (though he tells the others it was only six). They decide to continue down the passage and quickly find a small passage off to the right.

The passage appears to be the ogrima's lair. It contains a bed of straw and many skeletal remains. Searching under the straw, they find a large cache of a thousand copper bits but decide they aren't worth taking.

They also find a cache of potions, all labeled. The first is labeled "Oil of Romance" and the second "Oil of Obedience"; M'Balz jokes about what kind of evening the ogrima had planned for Gra'bir. The remaining potions are labeled "Oil of Horridness", "Oil of Great Faith", and two marked "Poison".

Heading back to the main passageway, they find it turns to the right after a distance. A short distance, it curves left then right again after another short distance.

Up ahead, the wind blows. There appears to be a 10' wide chasm in the middle of the hallway that leads deep into the earth.

Butrus looks around but spots no traps or ways to get across. Without thinking, M'Balz jumps across landing easily on the other side.

The rogue then throw his rope across to the others. He then hammers a spike into the ground and secures the rope to it.

Gra'bir is nervous about the spike staying in the ground so he examines the rock; but he can't tell if it is limestone or dolostone.

Using the rope tied around his waist, Butrus easily makes it across. After it is thrown back to Gra'bir, he jumps across without issue as well.

Butrus then has a plan; he wants to take a second spike from M'Balz and plant it parallel to the other then use a piece of the rope to create a trip wire. M'Balz, using his expertise, explains that the hempen rope is too thick to be a tripwire, so anything that doesn't see it would likely fall into the chasm anyway.

*** Session 13 - Scene 9 (of 9) ***

Talked out of the plan, they resume their travel. The hall curves right again, then left after a distance, then right again. Shortly after the last right there is another passage off to the right.

The group continues down the main hall. Just after the side passage, Gra'bir unknowingly steps across a warded area and is shocked by electricity. Despite the surprise of it, his mighty bowels manage to hold firm.

M'Balz and Butrus spot the ward, but without Adanband's mystical guidance they don't know how to avoid it.

Butrus tries grabbing on the M'Balz and heading through, hopefully he will get the shock instead. The plan doesn't work when M'Balz steps out of the way so he gets shocked after all.

M'Balz tries various schemes to avoid getting injured, but can't think of anything to do. Eventually, he decides to just go for it. His luck holds out, and he receives no injury from the ward. He tells the others his cat-like reflexes must have saved him.

The hall continues for a short way past the ward before ending. There is a door on the right wall.

After Gra'bir makes sure there is nothing at the dead end, Butrus hears nothing at the door. They find the door unlocked and open it.

The room beyond is decently large. Halfway down the left wall, there is a door but the room continues on as well.

As they step in, they see a large statue in the center of the room of two soldiers fighting, one driving a spear through the middle of the other. The statue is blackened with soot as if a fireball or something similar hit it at some point from the direction they entered.

Fearful of a trap, M'Balz uses a small stone to throw at the statue but nothing happens. He then enters the room and looks around but finds no trap mechanisms.

As they get in closer, M'Balz can also see a door along the left wall in the far corner. He sees nothing else of interest on the statue.

The group tries the door on the right first. Butrus finds the door safe of traps and Gra'bir hears nothing beyond. When they find the door locked, M'Balz tries to pick it but fails.

They then head down to the other door in the far corner. Butrus again declares the door safe and Gra'bir still hears nothing beyond.

This time, Butrus goes to try the door to see if it is locked but the door pull turns to a thick glue in his hand, sticking his hand to the door. Gra'bir wonders why the dwarf's hand was so sticky but Butrus yells at his that it was a trap.

The dwarf tries to pull his hand off, but can't make any progress. In the process, he manages to get one of his feet stuck to the door as well as he tries to push against it. Clearly the door is made of some kind of magic glue.

Gra'bir pulls out his scimitar, saying the only rational choice is to remove the stuck limbs. Butrus tells him there is no need, and slips out of his boot to free his foot. Gra'bir says his hand will still need to be chopped off.

The warrior says he should let it go quickly, before he loses any more limbs. But the dwarf does not want to lose his hand and yells for him to stop in mid-swing.

Butrus believes his magic can save him, while Gra'bir tries to convince him to just let him cut off the hand (saying he still has another one).

M'Balz, however, opts for a more practical solution. He has them tie the rope around Butrus and pull. Gra'bir suggests that will hurt more, and perhaps they should burn the door.

Butrus likes M'Balz's plan best. The rogue ties the rope around the dwarf, briefly considering robbing him but deciding against it. The two men pull mightily on the rope, ripping Butrus off of it with minimal skin loss.

After discussing how to open the door for a while, M'Balz ties the rope to an arrow and fires it into the door.

They then pull hard on the door, and the door comes off and splats on top of M'Balz. His entire front is covered in the glue door and he mumbles as he tries to breathe.

Believing it is the only way, Gra'bir prepares to light the glue on fire. Butrus stops him, casting a spell to destroy water.

The glue door then dries up, becoming cracked and brittle. Gra'bir uses the butt of his lance to break the door apart. It crumbles to pieces, with M'Balz able to breathe again.

He thanks the dwarf and tells Gra'bir he is a man of action, but should be more careful at indiscriminately lighting things on fire. Butrus, meanwhile, retrieves his boot and puts it back on.

Looking at the empty doorway, the group can see there is more hallway beyond.

*** Session 13 - Session Notes ***

This session illustrated once again the pacing problem with our gaming sessions. It's hard for me to have any kind of larger plot going on or keep any kind of thread moving when we have to skip so many sessions because of people being busy or out of town or whatever. By the time we try to pick it up a month later, everyone has pretty much forgotten what it was they wanted to do last time.

I'm in a bit of a quandary; on the one hand, the players want a more high-fantasy style "save the world" game. On the other, they can't even recall their own personal goals from the previous session much less ever remember to follow up on any of the dozens of clues I drop to strange things going on. They also try to actively avoid danger to a degree, which again makes it challenging to set things up.

The players even acknowledge it is a bit their own fault, but they aren't sure what to do next. So, this session I set things up to give them an actual quest and a dungeon to explore. Though even then they seem surprised by the labyrinth actually being a maze (several times the Butrus player commented the layout of the labyrinth didn't make sense, which is laughable since it is the secret maze below the city specifically designed to confuse/kill intruders).

Hopefully next session will occur this upcoming Friday, everyone will be able to make it, and the quest will get concluded so they can get a reward and feel safer taking on more challenges.

Random notes about the session:
* I originally thought about the first dwarf being caught in the net the captain of their first ship, then finding Butrus naked and re-amnesia'd later. But I thought that would be more hassle than it would be funny.

* The Adanband player does have a new character ready to go, but got stuck at work that night so couldn't join us.

* Obviously it makes little sense how Butrus managed to get to Hiyal, but I claim dramatic license to keep the game moving.

* The Rusty Barnacle is obviously a joke name. I debated if Rory would be inside if they approached it, but that would probably be one coincidence too many.

* I liked the idea of a weapons shop where the wife made everything overly fanciful. Pink flamingo feathers for arrows make no real sense (particularly in this location), but its really a rule of funny thing.

* Anderson MacCutcheon comes from the TV show Lost. I used his name in my 4e campaign, so in this campaign he's coming out of retirement.

* There's more (a lot more) to the MacCutcheon fleet story, but more on that later.

* I wanted to introduce the idea of Butrus' hideout right away to give him some solid background. I figure if they bother to come to the city to learn a story, it's my job to give them one.

* Imam Dao Ling and Sister Saffanah are based on Father Dowling and Sister Stephanie from the Father Dowling Mysteries TV show. I specifically made the imam from Kara-Tur so I could fit that joke in.

* The "Oroborus" line comes from issue #350 of the Fantastic Four where the real Dr. Doom uses it to restore Kristoff's memory. I've always liked that and have used it several times in RPG campaigns over the years.

* The four threats are intended as the "high fantasy" aspect of the campaign; should the PCs bother to pay attention enough to what is going on.

* The Beggar King comes from the Al-Qadim setting, though there he's called the Beggar Caliph (I changed the name to avoid confusion with another plot going on that isn't fully revealed yet). The Bah'lain part is all my idea, related to Father Dowling, and should be revealed next session.

* I had to heavily hint the players along when they tried to remember who told them about the four threats (hence all the false guesses).

* Brull and Chorgan Al-Lornac, along with Yuta Al-Tralesta, are all taken more or less from the episode The Vengeance Factor from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Despite everyone at the table being big fans of the show, I don't think anyone caught the reference even though several lines I spoke were lifted straight from it.

* Yuta isn't just here for that plot line; her family and its ties to the conspiracy plot are still a major plot point (that again, the PCs show no interest whatsoever in pursuing).

* The Bi'gus Dik'us joke is taken from Life of Brian (which personally is my preferred Python movie; I find the Holy Grail a bit played out).

* The labyrinth crawl played out much, much slower in session. Just deciding which passageway to go down at the first branch they came to took forever. I had to keep telling them it is a maze so they better get used to a lot of decisions along those lines.

* The labyrinth is intentionally bizarre and nonsensical (the way dungeons are originally described in D&D - the lairs of mad geniuses). I wanted it to be much more strange event and trap-heavy than others we'd done to make it more unsettling.

* The ogrima was a last minute addition to give the net trap some extra bite.

* The glue door was my favorite trap, particularly when the players' utterly terrible problem-solving ideas all involved maiming / potentially killing the person stuck in the glue.

*** Session 14 - Cast of Characters ***

 M'Balz Al-Badassi: A human rogue from the city of Huzaz. M'Balz is the member of a noble family with political connections, but is bored with his wealthy lifestyle.

 Butrus ibn-Duha: A dwarf priest with a fervent faith, trying to atone for a past as a con man who sold false indulgences.

And introducing...

Abdul-Aziz: A warrior from Hiyal who ran afoul of a local gang.

*** Session 14 - Scene 1 (of 7) ***

Looking at the doorway beyond, Gra'bir decides to stay back and guard the rear while Butrus and M'Balz investigate. He makes sure to hold on to the map, not trusting the two not to lose it as he wants to be sure they can get out.

Butrus takes the lead as they head down the hall. After immediately curving to the left, the hallway goes down a long ways. The two continue to follow it as it eventually curves to the left.

As they round the curve, they see it continues for a bit then curves right, but there is also a door along the right wall. Butrus makes his way towards the door, but a cloud of burning gas fills the chamber. M'Balz is blinded by the stinging gas while Butrus resists it.

Butrus takes the blinded rogue by the hand and leads him back in the corridor to wait and see if the blindness wears off. He tries using his waterskin to wash out M'Balz's eyes but that doesn't seem to help.

Around this time, a figure emerges from around the corner. It appears to be some kind of skeletal servant in robes.

It's moving quickly, so Butrus knows he can't outrun it. Instead, he tries to use his faith to turn the undead creature, but it resists.

The crypt servant moves over and punches the dwarf hard. Butrus calls out for M'Balz to assist him. The blind rogue swings wildly, but trips and falls on his own javelin, wounding himself. He cries out that the "knave has got him", telling the creature it will pay for that.

M'Balz gets himself up and charges at the direction he believes the creature is at. His head smacks directly into one of the corridor walls.

Butrus scores a solid hit on the monster with his mace, and fends off its counterattacks. M'Balz, still swinging wildly, manages to cut himself again with his javelin.

The priest then scores a smashing blow, crushing several of the skeleton's bones. It hits him back with a punch, then follows it up with two more.

M'Balz tries to use Butrus' grunts of pain to target his attack, but still misses. Butrus himself fares no better as the creature fends off his attack and strikes back with another powerful blow.

Butrus misses with another of his attacks, but M'Balz scores a lucky hit with his javelin. The creature begins to weaken, and turns its attention to the rogue. Its punches are ineffective at penetrating his armor.

The priest breaks off part of the creature's arm with another solid mace hit but M'Balz can't find the mark a second time. The crypt servant however, does, landing a couple of punches on the rogue.

M'Balz tries to attack back, but misses. Butrus misses with his attack as well, and is punched in response. After taking the last blow, Butrus crushes the creature's skull, destroying it. The remains fall into a piles of bones.

Butrus searches the remains, but finds nothing. As he finishes up, M'Balz's sight begins to return.

*** Session 14 - Scene 2 (of 7) ***

Before heading forward, Butrus uses his magic to heal himself and M'Balz. They then head back to the door, with M'Balz reminding Butrus about the gas trap just as he sets it off again.

This time, M'Balz manages to resist the burning gas but Butrus is blinded. M'Balz tells the priest he will protect him, but instead of retreating back into the hall again, he listens at the door and says it is quiet.

Since Butrus is blinded, he feels he has improved hearing and wants to listen at the door as well. When he listens, he can tell there is something in the room beyond but can't tell what it is.

M'Balz ignores the warning, believing the dwarf to be mentally addled due to the gas. He opens the door, seeing a large room beyond. He can see it has a couple of doors – one along the left wall and one on the far wall; the right side of the room cannot be seen.

As they head inside, the lamp illuminates the pack of three giant lizards nested on the right side of the room.

The lizards move in to claim their meal; both M'Balz and Butrus suffer a bite. In response, M'Balz stabs into the one attacking him with his javelin while Butrus tries to figure out what is going on.

Nearby, an unconscious man named Abdul Aziz on the far side of the room wakes up. He does not recall how he got there, but does notice the dwarf and man under attack by lizards. A trained warrior, he readies himself for action.

As Abdul readies his weapon, M'Balz stabs the javelin into the lizard again, killing it. Butrus just tries to back up, still not fully understanding what is going on.

The two remaining lizards bite M'Balz and Butrus, badly wounding each of them. Abdul attempts to attack one with his scimitar, but misses.

M'Balz tries to explain what is happening to Butrus, but is unable to score another hit. He and Abdul manage to fend off the lizards' attacks.

Butrus tries a different tactic, using his speak with animals spell to attempt to warn the lizards to leave or die. The lizards seem unfazed by the attempt.

However, the attempt does distract them long enough for M'Balz to score a solid hit with his javelin. Abdul also strikes the other one with a grazing blow from his scimitar.
The lizards attack back, badly wounding M'Balz. He collapses to the floor, unconscious. Abdul tries to strike them back, but misses.

Butrus decides to go ahead and swing wildly. It connects with the wall. One of the lizards bites his leg hard.

The other lizard bites Abdul's arm. Shaking off the attack, he strikes out with his scimitar, slashing across the beast.

Butrus continues to swing wild, but the attacks are ineffective as is Abdul's scimitar. The dwarf is then bit again by a lizard and begins bleeding.

The bleeding increases as Butrus is bit again. In desperation, he drinks the potion of horridness. He suddenly realizes the potion must have been mislabeled, as it was really an elixir of health and cures his blindness. Meanwhile, Abdul once again fails to penetrate the lizard's armor.

One of the lizards bites into Abdul. He then drives his scimitar down through the lizard's head, killing it.

The other lizard bites hard into Butrus. As he collapses from his wounds, he smashes it's spine with his mace, killing it as well.

With the battle over, Abdul notes the two humanoid appear to be dying. Looking around, he spots a pair of healing potions in the lizard nest. He quickly pours the liquids down the throats of the men, stabilizing them.

*** Session 14 - Scene 3 (of 7) ***

M'Balz and Butrus wake up to find Abdul standing over them. M'Balz greets him and asks his name. The man introduces himself as Abdul Aziz, saying he doesn't know how he got there but must have upset someone.

Considering the name a moment, M'Balz asks if he was related to minister Tariq Aziz. Abdul explains that is his older brother.

Butrus introduces himself as well, saying he is a priest but is currently weakened. He explains he and M'Balz are down in the labyrinth to kill a man. When Abdul asks what the man has done that is so evil, M'Balz clarifies they don't actually know the man or much about what he's done.

When the dwarf goes on to explain he is on a quest from his temple, Abdul understands better. Abdul surmises that as Butrus is a holy man tasked by the church to kill the other, he must be the good one in the conflict.

Philosophical discussion aside, M'Balz is convinced they must leave the labyrinth for now to recover. Butrus, however, feels a compelling urge from the Loregiver to stay down there on his quest.

M'Balz grabs a large sack from his backpack and points over to a corner of the lizard nest, saying "Jewels!" When Butrus turns to look, he covers him with the sack and tries to capture him to haul him out. After some rather feminine slap-fighting, M'Balz prevails.

With the dwarf slung over his shoulder, M'Balz starts to head out of the room. Abdul finds the whole matter rather strange, but agrees living to fight another day takes priority. M'Balz explains how the dwarf is under a quest spell and will need to be moved.

Butrus, inside the sack, confirms he is on a quest from the Loregiver. Thinking quickly, he drinks the other potion he has, the potion of great faith. However, it, too, appears to have been a mislabeled potion of growth as Butrus begins to grow to 25 feet tall, splitting the bag and his clothes and popping off his armor and equipment.

Because of the height of the room, Butrus is forced to be bent over, filling up large amounts of the room. Abdul muses the potion would have been more valuable during the fight while Butrus explains the growth shows the will of his god to remain in the labyrinth.

Frustrated at the dwarf's obstinate behavior, M'Balz slaps the giant dwarf penis in front of him as hard as he can. Feeling the sting, Butrus responds by pinning him up against the wall with his huge hand, warning him not to do that again. He once again tells the others they may leave freely, but he is staying there. He then releases the rogue.

M'Balz once again makes an impassioned plea to Butrus that they need to leave. But the dwarf is not swayed, saying he needs to fulfill his mission of faith.

After considering a plan for M'Balz and Abdul to head back up for supplies and rest, M'Balz ultimately decides they can just rest in this room.

*** Session 14 - Scene 4 (of 7) ***

As they make plans, M'Balz realizes he has not introduced himself to Abdul yet; he gives his name as Ra'uf Al-Man'ne. The two lament they've met under such unusual circumstances, noting the dwarf is usually better behaved.

M'Balz goes on to explain how they are hunting for the Beggar King. Abdul agrees to join their group as he is looking for good deeds to accomplish.

With Butrus positioning his large body to block one of the doors, M'Balz has him take the first watch while the two of them sleep.

About an hour later, Butrus shrinks back down to normal size. At the end of his shift, he passes it to Abdul. When M'Balz has his watch, he notices the dwarf is returned to normal size as well.

As the night moves along, the door they originally entered through suddenly opens. Several of the crypt servant creatures begin pouring into the room.

M'Balz calls out to the others to wake them and quickly lights a flask of lamp oil, throwing it at the floor in the middle of the throng. The explosion of fire keeps the creatures at bay for a moment, singeing a couple of them.

Butrus wonders if they should head out one of the other doors, but elects to first try to use his power to turn them. Summoning the strength of the Loregiver, he calls out and forces them back. The creatures slink back into the darkness.

M'Balz then spikes the door shut. They also pile the lizards along the side door, trying to make them look menacing while blocking the door. They then go back to sleep.

*** Session 14 - Scene 5 (of 7) ***

After waking, Butrus uses his healing spells to recover himself and Butrus as best he can. The healing magic has trouble curing his many wounds, and at the end he is still badly wounded.

M'Balz tells Butrus they should stay and heal up another day, noting that way they wouldn't be leaving the maze per his ridiculous demands. Butrus agrees, feeling it would not violate his quest.

Several hours into the waiting, pounding begins at the spiked door. It appears the door will be breaking down soon.

Butrus calls for them to go, but M'Balz wants them to take positions in front of the door while he hides off the side. His plan is to slip behind them and backstab them.

The dwarf decides to try and pantomime movements with the dead lizards (inspired by a story he heard about a couple of simpleton servants and their weekend at the home of a wealthy merchant named Bihr Na'hi). Abdul crouches behind the corpses, hoping to use them as a makeshift rampart.

When the crypt servants break through the door, Butrus attempts to force them back again, but this time fails. The creatures quickly pour into the room, with six of them making their way in.

Butrus calls for them to retreat. Abdul maneuvers the lizard bodies out of the way and Butrus throws open the door, only to discover it is a 10' x 10' closet.

M'Balz sprints for the other door. He tries to open it, but finds it locked.

Two of the crypt servants rush at Abdul and M'Balz. M'Balz is hit with one of the attacks, but Abdul defends himself.

M'Balz manages to pick the lock and rushes inside. Butrus can see it is a narrow, long room. They all get inside and the rogue spikes it closed.

As he does so, Abdul looks around. He notices the high ceiling has spikes on it, several with corpse remains still stuck on them. He alerts the others of a possible room trap.

Butrus looks around, but can't find the pressure plate that activates it. Abdul has no better luck. Butrus warns them not to move.

M'Balz advances a little ways in, and discovers the trigger mechanism. As they get in further, they see the far end of the room has no spikes. He tells the others to head across to the safe area.

Once everyone is at a safe point, they wait until the creatures break down the door and enter. M'Balz then triggers the trap, causing the ceiling panel to crush down on them then go back up. Several of the creatures survive the attempt but are stuck on the spikes on the ceiling, squirming around trying to get free.

The rogue responds by continuing to trigger the trap until they are all dead. Exploring around, they find no other exits or secret doors and decide to rest another day inside this room.

*** Session 14 - Scene 6 (of 7) ***

After the group feels rested and recovered, they head back out to the hallway and decide to continue on the path they didn't take before. Abdul now takes the lead.

The hallway curves many times as they follow it before ending at a T-intersection. Abdul leads the group to the right, only to find the hall ends abruptly in an old, plundered catacomb.

Turning around they head the other way. Another series of twists and turns in the path continues until they come to another T-intersection.

Turning right again, they follow another long, twisting hallway though many, many twists and turns. Butrus, unaccustomed to the design of labyrinths, believes the engineer who built the tunnels must have been drunk.

Eventually the corridor has a passageway off to the left but Abdul elects to continue straight. Eventually, the path comes to a dead end so they backtrack back and take the left passage.

After twisting around, that hall eventually continues on and has another passage off to the left. Again Abdul elects to go straight.

A short distance later, they come to yet another T-intersection. Butrus examines it, fairly certain they have not been this way before.

Abdul elects to take the right passage, though this time is careful to mark the intersection. Unfortunately, that way ends in a dead end so he is forced to go back.

After following various twists and turns in the hall, the group finds themselves at another T-intersection and elect to head right.

Many more twists later, they find the hallway broken up by another deep chasm. M'Balz drives another spike into the ground, tying the rope to it and around his waist. M'Balz then jumps across.

The rogue underestimates the distance, failing to make it to the other side. Luckily, the rope he has around himself holds for the moment, the spike saving him from the abyss.

Abdul and Butrus try to pull him up with the rope, but have problems. The rope begins fraying along the sharp edges. They eventually manage to get a good hold, but M'Balz slams into the side of the chasm wall. It takes some time, but they eventually get him up.

Once M'Balz is pulled back up, they double-up the rope to account for the fraying. On his second attempt, M'Balz makes it across. Butrus and Abdul follow, both easily making it across.

*** Session 14 - Scene 7 (of 7) ***

Continuing down the hall, they come to another T-intersection. Heading right, they eventually reach a door.

Abdul listens to the door, claiming it is safe beyond. M'Balz looks over the door, finding no traps. Abdul then opens it.

The room beyond is quite large and lit by a fireplace along the back wall. The fire appears to be magical in nature, as it creates unnatural shadows along the walls.

Unnoticed by the group, the shadow of M'Balz comes to life. It attacks him, causing injury. He dashes off to the side to try and not cast a shadow, but the move is ineffective.

Abdul tired from all the walking, spends his time trying to stay awake. Butrus leaps into action, trying to attack the shadow but missing.

M'Balz strikes out with the javelin, injuring the creature. Butrus misses with his mace, but Abdul connects with his scimitar. Unfortunately, the scimitar has no effect, causing M'Balz to figure out that only magical weapons will affect it. The rogue tosses his other javelin to Abdul, telling him it is magical.

The shadow lashes out at M'Balz again. He fends off one flurry of attacks, but is hit by a second. M'Balz stabs back into the creature, further injuring it. Abdul hits it as well, causing the creature to shriek out and disappear.

Butrus wants to head out of the room quickly, but M'Balz would rather stay and search the area. They decide to stay and search, but find nothing. Luckily, no more shadows emerge.

The room has doors on either side. With Butrus' prompting, Abdul elects for them to take the door to the right.

Beyond the door is a long hallway lit with magical candles. Butrus feels they are getting closer to their target. At the end is another door.

M'Balz checks the door, feeling it is free of traps. Butrus listens at it, hearing the slightest sound of water.

Abdul tries to open the door, but finds it locked. After M'Balz opens it, they find another hallway beyond.

Following the hallway through a couple of twists and turns, they discover a door off to the right. Listening, Butrus can tell the water source lies beyond it.

Once again, M'Balz clears the door of any traps and they open it. Inside, there is a small room with a natural spring in the corner and a bucket.

The rogue drinks some of the water. After making sure nothing bad happens to M'Balz, Butrus takes a drink as well.

As Butrus is filling his wineskin, M'Balz fills the bucket and pours it over the dwarf's head. Although annoyed, Butrus notices his armor seems shinier and stronger afterwards.

M'Balz repeats the process for all of them, having the same effect. A second attempt on Butrus does no good, but he continues a couple more times just to be sure. Eventually, the dwarf takes the bucket away from him to get him to stop.

The group decides to rest in this room for the night.

*** Session 14 - Session Notes ***

Unfortunately, this was a case of another session, another out of game mess. The Gra'bir player had to cancel at the last minute, the Abdul (formerly Adanband) our Skype player nearly canceled then showed up late because he wanted to do some things around the house first and finally kept falling asleep during the later half of the game. And obviously, things got way too silly.

D&D is one of those games I really like because it is easy for PCs to have clear goals, a clear mission, and not too many options. As a player, you have a crystal clear idea of what kind of character you can play and what your options are, and as the DM you can just set up a sandbox of adventure hooks and plots and let things progress.

Unfortunately, D&D also has a downside - you really need 4-6 solid PCs in a group to make the game hum along if you want to do much adventuring. All the PCs are level 4 or 5 now, but it is still a major challenge to have them encounter anything without it being a TPK (part of this is not the rules, but the fact the players tend to be terrible problem-solvers). When only 3 players can make the game, it is nearly impossible to do without fudging a bit (hence things like the conveniently-placed healing potions and the trap that helped them against the crypt servants).

While I fully intend to continue this campaign along, I'm focusing my creative energies towards setting up a future Cthulhubusters campaign (called Cthulhubusters - Crescent City, set in faux-New Orleans). Given the smaller number of players (and their tendency to be anti-heroes at best) I think that has potential with this group.

Random notes about the session:

* As explained, Gra'bir guarding the rear was just an excuse to explain why the PC suddenly went missing.

* The game started off terrible for the PCs, with M'Balz rolling four or five straight 1s (hence all the times he injured himself trying to act while blind).

* The fact they forgot about the gas trap and set it off again was hilarious.

* Strictly speaking, the room was probably too small for the giant lizards because I didn't pay enough attention to their size when I was placing monsters around.

* The original idea was for the PCs to find Abdul in the hallway at some point, with a story about how he ran afoul of a gang and was thrown down there for punishment. Since he showed up late, and M'Balz and Butrus were clearly going to die, he started out in the lizard room.

* Obviously the healing potions were a fudge to keep the PCs alive. If we lost two more characters then and there, the campaign would have imploded.

* The M'Balz player through in the Tariq Aziz joke reference, but no one actually caught it because we hadn't been paying attention to that bit of news.

* When Abdul said Butrus was clearly the good one since he came from the church, no one was sure if that was intended to be sarcastic or not.

* M'Balz trying to stuff Butrus in a sack didn't make much sense, and it got worse from there. Though we had a lot of laughs with the ensuing slapstick, it was pretty silly and makes little sense in the story.

* Butrus' potions were actually mislabeled (actually, all the potions they got were). I have the list of what each potion really is, so the potions curing blindness and causing growth were serendipitous, not something I fudged.

* Butrus' clothes coming off when he grew was rule of funny.

* M'Balz actually gives his false name as Ralph Al-Manah. I'm using Ra'uf because "Ralph" doesn't make much sense. For the last name, it's more a case that I didn't realize how the player intended the name to be spelled and by the time I did I'd already been writing in the other way and didn't want to bother to retcon it.

* M'Balz originally wanted to light the lizard corpses on fire with a flask of oil, until I reminded him the group only had one left.

* Butrus trying to make the dead lizards move to scare the undead was fucking stupid, so I'm the one that made the Weekend at Bernie's joke about it to mock him.

* I'm not sure trying to use the corpses as sandbags made much more sense.

* The 10' x 10' closet was on my map the whole time, as was the other door being locked. The fact they waited to even check the doors until monsters were invading shows the lack of planning.

* I took much pity on them with the spike trap to avoid a TPK.

* About half-way through the session, they had made so many bad rolls I started using the YouTube app on my tablet to play the "Price is Right Losing Horn" every time they rolled crappy. It was hilariously mocking by the end.

* The Butrus player seemed continually confused that the maze was a fucking maze. That really got on my nerves after a while, and even the other players were like, "Duh it doesn't make any sense, its designed to keep people out".

* The chasm caused more confusion, as he was thinking it was a cavern for some time. Despite the fact they encountered the exact same thing last session.

* Obviously I gave a lot of chances to M'Balz at the chasm - one more bad roll and he was gone for.

* Originally the plan was for all of their shadows to come to life, but by the time they reached the room, that just seemed cruel.

* M'Balz clowning around was the only reason they discovered the magical effect of the water. I felt I'd used the "magical water source heals you" bit way too many times, so I wanted this one to do something different.

*** Session 15 - Cast of Characters ***

M'Balz Al-Badassi: A human rogue from the city of Huzaz. M'Balz is the member of a noble family with political connections, but is bored with his wealthy lifestyle.

Butrus ibn-Duha: A dwarf priest with a fervent faith, trying to atone for a past as a con man who sold false indulgences.

Abdul-Aziz: A warrior from Hiyal who ran afoul of a local gang.

Gra'bir Boubi: A human warrior and hunter from the desert tribe of the Wah'na Poq-yah tribe of the Haunted Lands, looking to prove himself as a great warrior.

And special guest star...

Mirah: A teenage human sorceress.

*** Session 15 - Scene 1 (of 7) ***

Waking from their rest in the room with the magical spring, M'Balz, Butrus, and Abdul see the door suddenly open to reveal Gra'bir. He appears to have also gained a companion in the maze, a teenage girl who is dressed like a sorcerer.

Gra'bir proclaims he has "rescued a damsel". After some coaxing, Butrus gets out of her that her name is Mirah. Butrus asks Gra'bir if she is a good sorcerer or a bad one, and he responds he has not witnessed her magical prowess but she hasn't tried to kill him yet and thus is morally superior to at least two of their group.

Butrus then complains to Gra'bir about the sack being put over his head and rambles on about the mission from his god and its importance. More grounded, he notes they do still need to heal up first as their journey thus far has left them weakened.

M'Balz hopes the sorceress has some healing potions with her, but she does not. Gra'bir suggests Butrus use his god-granted magical powers. Taking Gra'bir's suggestion, Butrus uses his magical powers to heal M'Balz twice, curing him of all his injuries.

Gra'bir explains he and Mirah got lost in the maze; he attempted to map his travels, but notes it is a maze and thus makes no sense. He even managed to lose the map he started when they first entered the maze, though he was able to track down M'Balz and Butrus.

The two groups catch up quickly, with Butrus and M'Balz giving a brief (and not completely accurate) account of some of their encounters in his absence. They also introduce Abdul.

In their discussions, M'Balz realizes Gra'bir and Mirah have not been enhanced by the powers of the spring yet. He quickly pours water on both of them to give their armor and robes the magical protective powers granted by the liquid.

Once that is done, the group decides to continue on their journeys down the hall outside the room in the direction they haven't been through yet. Gra'bir takes the lead with Abdul behind him. Butrus takes the third position with Mirah behind him, and M'Balz in the rear guard.

They quickly find the hall continues on or goes off to a passage on the right. Gra'bir takes the passage to the right. After a brief turn, it ends in a door. Gra'bir knocks heartily at the door as Butrus wails in disbelief of his stupidity. To everyone's surprise, the door opens...