Overview:
The first session covered the aftermath of Silverhall, where some of the equipment the characters had collected in their big day out was identified. The equipment from the Shattershadow Captain is still unknown, but the duergar mithral full plate was found to have been magical, its dweomer probably unraveled by the attack that removed everything beneath the knees of the unlucky duergar that wore it.

The party learned something more about the nature of the Curse of the Char'gr Wastelands, as well as being shown a glimpse of the inner workings of the duergar Kingdom of the Anvil. The duergar are apt to keep their end of bargains - though they are likely to try and twist them to their own advantage. Of course.

Furthermore, they learned that although Light may be defeated, it doesn't mean that it is gone. And, just perhaps, there might be one last stronghold of Light.

Experience:
The player characters were awarded 1 000 xp per night they had participated, plus a 2 000 xp story bonus. This was a three-nighter. People whose characters had died, did not receive the story bonus. A special 1 500 xp story bonus was awarded to the character of the player that had (correctly) unraveled the backstory so far - an impressive feat.

Details:
Their payment overdue, and getting anxious for some action, the drow decided to take matters into their own hands. The drow cleric and one of the twin drow wizards - and their hobgoblin sla... umm... advisor, of course - set out for Demonskull Gate, the closest duergar stronghold they knew of.

Barging in without any clues whatsoever to the inner workings of the duergar politics of Demonskull Gate, the characters nevertheless did not let their cluelessness be any hindrance to overwhelming arrogance. After nearly provoking the duergar administration into attacking the drow with intent to kill, they managed to get hold of a member of the Oredelver clan.

The poor duergar nearly bolted when he saw who he was supposed to meet. The Keymaster clan, not overly fond of neither the Rocksteady nor the Oredelver clan, had said nothing about who he was supposed to meet.

Fearing painful death - clergy of Sargonnas, the Consort of the Spider Queen aren't well known for their sane and cheery demeanor - the duergar swore that he knew that the small caravan carrying the payment for the drow had been sent. Whether it had actually reached its destination - well, that was something he had to check up on.

A few hours later - half a day or so - he returned, with a map inscribed in a small disc of brass. Containing little in the way of details, Demonskull Gate was clearly noted, as well as a symbol of two hands, close together and open towards the sky. This pair of hands, known as - quite simply - the Open Hands, denotes the edge of the lands where the duergar regularly patrol rather than just claiming control. This was the last known point where it was certain the caravan had passed - the guards that had followed the caravan up to this point had returned.

The curse of the Char'gr Wastelands reared its ugly head twice in the first two sessions. First and foremost, the curse on the duergar mithral full plate found in the Char'gr Wastelands faded, its curse a direct function of it being buried in the wastes themselves and fading with time.

The second effect of the curse manifested itself at an inopportune moment indeed. During the second session, the party of characters (then comprising the drow cleric, the drow wizard Thular Noquar, and the hobgoblin fighter/druid) encountered a mated pair of Tiger Renders. The Tiger Render (a variant of the Grey Render) surprised the druid quite thoroughly (that should teach the players to post a guard with absolutely no skill ranks in Spot), and after a few rounds of combat the hobbie druid decided to let loose with a call lightning. After all, the sky above the Char'gr Wastelands is an eternally roiling dust storm.

Sure enough, the call lightning spell worked beautifully, and called down a powerful bolt of lightning from the overcast sky. A forked bolt. One bolt hit the Tiger Render - and one bolt hit the hobbie druid. Quite nasty, that.

Later on, the hobbie druid lead the party around a couple of encounters that promised to have been quite painful. One large nest of Fire Vipers was handily bypassed, as well as a ravine in which something tough lives - tough enough to kill and eat a dire bear, evidenced by the crushed skull of a dire bear.

Reaching the Open Hands, the party found that someone was waiting for them - the duergar fighter that had been their guide on their previous jaunt which had led them to Silverhall. He informed them that he was there to help them recover their payment (and, obviously, though noone mentioned it - to keep them honest).

The party foolishly started by searching the ravine where they had spotted the crushed skull of a dire bear. In the end of the ravine, there was a sulphurous pool of hot water. After having repositioned themselves so that they could drop things into the pool, the cleric started tossing big rocks into the pool - to see what happened.

Then, the acid dragon that laired there came crawling out to see what had dared disturb it while it was relaxing in its lair. After some preliminary fighting without either side really committing to the fight, the party (wisely, I might add) decided to run away - to live to loot another day.

Then, the druid remembered the carrion birds they had spotted earlier - in the first session, actually. Large, black, reptilian carrion birds - more pterodactyls than anything else - had circled a particular spot some distance away when they had made their way to the Open Hands. (He didn't get bonus xp for that one, since he was supposed to be a druid - and know about such things as carrion eaters and whatnot, but I had to spell it out for him. Had he thought of it by himself, he would have gotten bonus xp. But he didn't. Oh well.)

Reaching the ridge where the carrion eaters had circled, they found what was left of the duergar caravan. Stripped of their equipment and all valuables, the bodies had been left to be disposed of in the most natural way possible - to be eaten. But, the ambushers had left a trail - which the druid could track (once he had wild shaped himself into a dog to get bonuses to his tracking roll).

Tracking proved a fairly difficult task, but with the insane modifiers the druid managed to get on the skill roll, it wasn't anywhere near impossible.

Then, the party blundered into the group that had ambushed the duergar caravan - a small task force of Light consisting of Bulwark (Dwarven Defender of Light), Lianna (Arcane Archer of Light) and the Masked One (Masked Mage of Light).

Knowing that such a multitude of champions of Dark meant that they would be in deep dodo, Bulwark did what he could - he sacrificed himself to make sure that Lianna and the Masked One escaped with their precious cargo of mithril. That, and Bulwark was the only one who didn't know the location of the Last Bastion of Light and therefore that information couldn't be ripped out of his soul no matter what they did to him.

Charging heedlessly into combat, he bought time for the Masked One and Lianna to get away - and killed two champions of Dark in the combat as well.

The druid was killed, as was the kobold Eldritch Master. One of the drow wizards escaped only because he beat Bulwark on initiative - but in the end, even mighty Bulwark could not overcome the collective might of the drow spellcasters arrayed against him. Bulwark died, the gold that the drow had been promised was recovered, but the mithril was not. However, the items taken from Bulwark's body was some recompense. It wasn't as if any of the drow had died, after all. It was a fair trade.

Experience:
The player characters were awarded 1 000 xp per night they had participated, plus a 1 000 xp story bonus. This was a two-nighter. Some individual adjustments of xp was given, the largest one (750 xp) to the player whose drow cleric had sacrificed one of his important magical items (a Cloak of Resistance +3) to learn Restoration.

Details:
After the pretty intense conclusion to Payment Overdue, the group took it easy a couple of weeks. Then, gifts started trickling in. Once a week or so, a small but well-armed duergar party arrived, giving the drow a gift of some expensive item or other.

Then, the invitation requesting their presence in Thorbarkel came, explaining that they would need to bring their gifts in order to properly present them in the party.

Obviously, the drow were of (at least) two minds about the whole thing. Two (one of the wizards and the cleric) argued that this might be a cunning plan from the duergars to collect the drow in one spot so that an ambush would take them out easier. Lovely paranoia. I'll have to foster it some more.

In the end, it was decided to treat the invitation as genuine, but prepare spells as if it was, in fact, a trap.

After a short wait near the Open Hands, the duergar met in force to properly escort the drow to Thorbarkel. The escort was complete with a band of bards - mostly percussionists of some sort or other - to 'lift the spirits properly'.

The duergar force also included Serrash Rocksteady, the second-in-command of the fief of the Rocksteady clan. A pleasant and comfortable ride later (the drow rode in palanquins carried by strider lizards, while the lizzie fighter had to walk), the party got a short glimpse of the wonders of Thorbarkel before they were presented with their own quarters in the citadel of Thorbarkel and told very firmly that they were guests, and proper guests of Thorbarkel didn't stray far from their (very well-appointed, I might add) quarters... because Thorbarkel was a city not without its dangers and... one never knew what might happen with guests if they strayed too far from their quarters. The warning was quite effective - the drow didn't even try any mischief.

The awaited trap wasn't. After the preliminary festivities, the various gifts were presented, presenting the clan who had given the gift. Suddenly, the leader of clan Stronginthearm shouted 'I know what you're trying to do and it won't work', and then activated a magical item of some sort that whisked him away on the wings of magic. Serrash Rocksteady quite calmly continued his presentation of the various gifts, while the retainers of the Stronginthearm clan quietly backed away, weapons at the ready.

Then, just as calmly as discussing the quality of some ore he had just found, Serrash Rocksteady declared a blood hunt on clan Stronginthearm, with the usual rules - no kill stealing, no summoning creatures that could go out of control, and so on and so forth.

The party leapt at the chance to kill some duergar and loot them - and with official sanction, no less! Enrolled in the duergar paperwork as 'clan Noquar' engendered a discussion of whether they'd been correctly entered, as the drow insisted it should read 'House Noquar'. A duergar mercenary that came to present his contract and his suggestion that the drow might employ him, explained that it wasn't a difference, really - while 'clan' suggested more of a business venture (and might be construed as 'company' in the context), a drow 'house' was much the same - but blood lines played a much greater part.

Happy with that explanation, the drow partied the rest of that evening, and was ready for some serious bloodshed later that evening.

The assault on the Stronginthearm citadel wasn't quite as easy as the players anticipated. Two groups were standing near - but not too near - the Stronginthearm citadel. One group belonged to clan Oredelver - the clan that already owed the drow quite a lot for freeing Silverhall, and the other group belonged to clan Shadowfriend - a clan of freaky duergar that often wears but little armor, and is usually clad in deep, black robes.

The drow bypassed the quite strong defenses of Stronginthearm by merely using dimension door.

Arriving in the access hall of Stronginthearm, they were assaulted by 28 duergar, four groups of four using crossbows in mobile shelters (called 'turtles' by the duergar), and two groups of six each with an equal mix of great axes and halbards.

It didn't help diddly squat in the end. All the well-planned defense of Stronginthearm's best fighters (Warrior 3s and 4s the lot of them) went to pieces under the determined assault of two high-level drow wizards, supplemented by the pure slaying power of a cleric of Selvetarm and the skilled might of a lizzie fighter. Two fireballs, a lightning bolt and a few magic missiles later, the fight was practically over.

Running fast along (after opening the outer gate and waving the others inside), the party quickly discovered two secret doors leading to a hidden maze of narrow passageways connecting various parts of the citadel. Zeroing in on the private quarters of Stronginthearm, the party arrived in a hallway with two galleries - one on each side - divided from the hallway itself by steel bars.

The invisibility purge the cleric cast revealed the ambush. Two groups of three duergar each were hidden in the galleries, one on each side, having employed both the duergar innate ability of invisibility and physically hiding behind a low brick wall set up in the galleries. The invisibility purge also revealed the group of three Shadowfriends that had been invisible in the middle of the hallway. The ambush was tripped, but the drow weren't the target.

A hail of crossbow bolts later, one of the Shadowfriends were mortally wounded. One of the Shadowfriends - a duergar with no hair whatsoever and a distinctly withered look - cast a death knell spell on his dying clansman, using his fading life energy to boost his own powers. The drow cleric appreciated this tactic very much, making a note to himself to use the same tactic if the opportunity ever arose.

One Shadowfriend tossed a jar of something explosive into one of the galleries, but didn't have much time to do anything about the other before the drow got into the fight. A disintegrate spell and a summoning later, one xorn was busy eating the remains of one group of duergar, while the other duergar were efficiently slaughtered in melee by the lizzie fighter and the drow cleric.

When shrunken one of the two remaining Shadowfriends told the drow to beat it - because they had dibs on Stronginthearm - the drow didn't like it much. Not much at all. Hissing in frustration, the shrunken Shadowfriend threw the other one at the group of drow in a well-practiced attack maneuver. The other Shadowfriend's heavy cloak flew aside, revealing a spiked breastplate and bracers covered in poison.

The energy drain that the shrunken Shadowfriend cast on one of the drow wizards did much to make the players very, very concerned. Nevertheless, they got through the following fight okay (though the shrunken Shadowfriend teleported away through the use of a strange shadow door he conjured). Looting the quarters of Stronginthearm after disabling the ingenious layered traps on the door netted the party some quick treasure. Then, they went to look for the vault itself.

Arriving in the vaults through the secret passageways, they discovered their old 'friends', the champions of Light. Lianna the Arcane Archer was there, as well as the Masked One. A new addition to the group of light was a guy clad in a leafy-green scale mail, this one also masked like both the others.

The drow didn't dare to interfere with the looting of the cache of mithril the Lighties did. Though Lianna wanted to avenge Bulwark's death (Bulwark being the dwarven defender that died taking out two of the party in the final encounter in Payment Overdue), the Masked One restrained her. Before long, the Lighties teleported away through the arcane might of the Masked One.

Looting the vault, the drow netted some important magical items, as well as getting some gold and gems. Monetary wealth isn't everything, but it's pretty much. Extraction was quick and easy, and the Citadel of Mirrors was but a teleport spell away after that.

In the aftermath of this excursion, the drow cleric Zen sacrificed his cloak of resistance to learn restoration - which was necessary to counter the energy drain effect. Nasty spell, energy drain.