Episode 343 - Volcanic Mansion Alone

We continue our hellish descent into this beautiful home. Wish us luck.

## **Story**

### Long Story

In the mansion of The Ballista Twins, from underneath a fallen pile of books, Toby Treacletart peeks his head out, groaning in pain. He, Rowan, and Eckhart Dayhammer are all there, and they communicate using their sending stones with the other group, Skud and Lahni. Those two inform the other that there is a rope ladder in the basement, which Skud is intent on climbing. He grabs it, and gives it a Tug, which brings down a heavy bag of flower on his head. Ouch. It seems the rope ladder was A TRAP! With no other way out of the basement, the two friends begin stacking precarious furniture to climb out.

Meanwhile, Toby and Rowan return through the door, entering the foyer once again. This time, they see the dreaded imp Kevimp McBallister, aiming a sort of barreled weapon at Toby. He fires it, shooting a projectile at Toby's Treacletarts. Not sure if this counts as A TRAP or not, but let's just say it is. He then runs upstairs. Toby asks Eckhart to Lay on Hands him, so he can be in not so much pain, and then takes out a bag of sand (which he never bought), and uses it to make the slippery oily stairs walkable. They send Rowan up first, and as she ascends, the stairs become a ramp! The half-elf is sent backward, barely able to dodge out of the way of the statue at the bottom, which has swung its sword out to stab her. This did result in a bit of slashing to Toby and Eckhart, but they're fine. Rowan, getting fed up, casts *Ensnaring Strike* on the stairs, forming a viney way of climbing up it, which they all then do.

Lahni and Skud make it out of the basement, and find themselves in a storage pantry. There's only one door, and it isn't hot, so Lahni opens it up, slowly. Aaaaaannd, it is, of course, A TRAP! In this case, a string connects the door to a bag full of hammers and knives, which fall down onto the poor Lahni. But they are in the next room, so I guess that's a plus. This room is the dining room, and has a long table, elegant candelabras, a double door to the south (the one that leads to the foyer), and a door on the western wall, opposite where they came in. They decide to go west, and Skud takes his turn opening the door. He first taps the handle. Nothing happens. He then quickly throws the door open. Nothing happens. Assuming it is safe, he then brazenly strides through, triggering A TRAP! in the form of a pressure plate, causing a burning flame to torch the top of his head. Now afire, the panicking dude sees naught but a single bucket of liquid in the room, so he dunks his head into it. Surely it isn't going to be a flammable liquid, right? What's that? Oh, it is? Jeez, this Kevimp character is pure evil! So, yeah, I guess Skud explodes, but it's pretty cartoonish, so he's fine. In the kitchen area is a dumbwaiter, which Lahni refuses to get into, so she heads back to the double doors, kicking them open. Shall it be A TRAP!? It shall! Fortunately, this TRAP! was a burning hot door handle, but Lahni was able to avoid it! Hurray! The foyer contains Toby, Rowan, and Eckhart, having just been slashed by the statue, so now everyone is together. There's some healing done by Eckhart Dayhammer, with little explanation as to why *Lay on Hands* still works.

The party stands on the upper landing. There's a hallway leading to a stairway to the North, going to the Third Floor. There is a door to the East, and a door to the West. They decide to send Eckhart Dayhammer through the door to the West, but it isn't A TRAP! They find themselves in the room of Burt Ballista, as evident by the many portraits of himself there are. Toby and Eckhart decide to take the biggest one, and are surprised to find a treasure map on the back of it. They do find the top of the dumbwaiter, and wouldn't you know it, it's A TRAP! There's a spiked ball on a rope that would have fallen onto them, so Lahni disables it by throwing the ball down. That's it for this room, so it's back through the hallway and into the door to the East. Also not A TRAP!, this door leads to the bedroom of Becky Ballista. Instead of pictures of herself, this room has pictures of Master Alder, the mysterious man who rescued Skud in the Monastery of Uthgar, all those years ago. Weird. On the back of one of these portraits is a shopping list, and Tony steals her bedsheets, insistent that it will come up again. They leave the room and trepidatiously head up the stairs to the attic.

Surprising no one, paint buckets swing down at them, but they are all able to dodge out of the way. Well, everyone but Dayhammer, who is sent careening all the way down to the foyer, groaning in pain. As if that weren't enough, he lands directly underneath the giant chandelier, which, of course, falls onto him and explodes, sending shards of black crystals everywhere. Dayhammer is wounded, but alive. He stays behind as the others proceed up the stairs. Lahni kicks open this final door, bringing them face to face, with Kevimp McBallister. The little shit aims his weapon at her and fires, shooting her in the crotch as well. As she doubles over in pain, Kevimp runs for the window, determined to escape. A zip line marks his exit strategy, but Rowan fires off a single arrow, intending to fell the creature. Unfortunately, he is quite weak, and Rowan is level 19, and for some reason, you can't do ranged non-lethal damage, so she straight up murders Kevimp McBallister. He's dead. That piece of shit.

### Short

Mostly, the party tries to make it through the mansion in one piece. They finally meet up together, and face down against Kevimp McBallister, whom Rowan accidently kills.

## **Trivia**

* In the last episode, Dodge didn't believe in Sweeties Day. This episode, Michael clarifies that the reason for that is, they need to get his card back to restore his belief
* Tim mentions that they paid back their loan to the Ferrim Pecunia, but I don't know about that
* The portrait of Burt Ballista is 15x15 ft. Probably not super important, but it was specified in the show, so, here that information is...
* Master Alder has an iron tooth
* It's only been 14 minutes since the start of the previous episode
* The party gains a portrait of Burt Ballista, with a treasure map on the back. They also have a portrait of Master Alder with a shopping list on the back, and Becky Ballista's bedsheets. I'll probably start an inventory section one of these days, but not this day

## **In This Episode...**

### **Cast and Player Characters**

* Michael DiMauro - *Dungeon Master*
* Tim Lanning - Toby Treacletart / Hoby
* Jennifer Cheek - Rowan Grey
* Mike Bachmann - Skud Derringer
* Nika Howard - Lahnik "Lahni" Caplain

### **Non-Player Characters**

* Eckhart Dayhammer
* Kevimp McBallister

### **Locations**

* The Elemental Plane of Fire
	+ The TRAPPED Volcano Base of The Ballista Twins

### **Quest Log Updates**

* [On-Hold] - Stop Tiamat!
* [Active] - Destroy The Orb!
	+ [Active] - Find the first missing piece
		- [Active] - Gain access to the Elite Forge
			* [Active] - Defeat the Master of the Air Plane
			* [Active] - Defeat the Master of the Earth Plane
			* [Active] - Defeat Lucious Incendous, the Master of the Fire Plane
			* [Active] - Defeat the Master of the Water Plane
				+ [Active] - Retrieve Dodge Grabbit's Bone Card, from their house imp
	+ [On-Hold] - Find the third missing piece
		- [On-Hold] - Investigate the final location
* [On-Hold] - Find Adira Harper
* [Backburner] - Find Lannie Caplain
	+ [On-Hold] - Investigate Galanthis
* [Active] - Find a way to pay back the Ferrim Pecunia bank of Pelor's Hope
* [Active][Jaeludra] - Investigate the Great Colosseum in Caer
* [Active][Jaeludra] - Investigate the Oracle's strange prophecies

### **Quotes**

**"Stop shooting my dick!"** ~ *Toby*

**"I can only imagine what fresh hell this will bring upon us..."** ~ *Lahni*

## **Rolls**

* **Recap**
	+ Tim - 3
	+ Bachmann - 2
	+ Jennifer - 13
	+ **Nika - 18**