Recap #18 - Let's Find Rathos

• With the vampire guardian dead the PCs searched the rest of her area and found a secret door behind one of the ornamental curtains lining the walls. The tunnel beyond was lined with alcoves containing the corpses of long-dead humanoids. Searching carefully for traps yielded a small amount of gold and silver.
• After 50 feet the tunnel led to the right and then ended abruptly in a cave in. With no where to go the group suspected another secret door was nearby. They started to back track and located a secret door at the back of one of the alcoves. Ethan proceeded through the door which led down a short hallway ending in another door.
• With little effort Ethan was able to open this final obstacle and was greeted with a room containing 2 gricks locked in a cage. However he did not perceive the triggered plate inside the room the locked the door behind him and released the gricks.
• While Ethan maneuvered himself into a corner, his comrades desperately attacked the locked door in order to provide him some aid. After three rounds they succeeded in smashing the old oak doors to bits. Luckily Ethan's deft moves were able to minimize the effectiveness of the gricks' attacks.
• Just as things were looking to be in control two secret doors opened in the south wall and 4 bugbear warriors burst into the room! They quickly took positions to maximize their flanking opportunities and Jonathon started to take a real beating. The PCs were spread among the attackers and were having difficulty dropping any single target.
• To make matters even worse a bugbear strangler manage to sneak up behind the group through the secret door and harass Sterling and Delian. Things were looking grim.
• Eventually Nenia successfully used Thunderwave to throw the bugbears against the wall and eliminate many of their flanks. From there the party was able to start dropping their foes. A several more rounds they were victorious.
• After a brief rest the group moved through the secret doors the warriors had come through to discover a barracks and a sergeant's room. The articles in that room seemed to indicate that the strangler was the leader of the warriors. They also discovered a second secret door leading into the alcoved hallway. It seems they had initially discovered the "trapped" entrance.
• They spent the next while moving throughout the complex. They passed through a dart board room that was actually a set of traps that shot paralyzing darts. Once discovered they easily overcame that obstacle.
• Beyond they discovered a meeting room complete with spy holes, a warehouse containing a large sum of gold and a skeleton key. They then came upon a room containing torturing equipment. In the corner was an old man sleeping in a bed.
• Ethan attempted to sneak into the room to subdue the old man but somehow the geezer knew he was there the second he stepped into the room. Without turning over he warned Ethan to leave the room at once or perish slowly in the mechanisms of the room. Of course the PCs didn't heed the warning and the old man leaped from the bed and transformed into a large Oni Night Haunter.
• The Oni was nearly successful in capturing the entire party with an area effect power that would have rendered them all unconscious (and captured) with a failed first saving throw. However Delian was quick enough to divert the attack on Ethan onto himself. While Ethan protected his comrades they slowly awakened.
• With its main attack used the battle more or less became a war of attrition. The Oni, however, had one final trick up its sleeve. When it was near defeat it transformed itself once more. This time it took a gaseous form and quickly escaped.
• The party took a brief rest and prepared to continue their search the hideout for either Rathos Bloodghost or the dragonshard they required.