Part 17: The Cloakwood Mines: Part 1
The Cloakwood Mines: Part 1
We trudged through Cloakwood for a second time, running from any random encounters. By the time we saw the fortress, it was night-time. Not that it really matters since we'll be underground where it's ALL dark.
Lakdaar tried to prevent us from entering the mines. He summoned 6 puny guards and tried to kill us. I dont really need to show you the end result of that fight do I?
Imoen hid in the shadows and snuck past the guards on the bridge to scout ahead and see how fortified the entrance was.
4 powerful bounty hunters waited for us near the entrance. This was going to be tough.
The rest of us crossed the bridge and killed the two guards in front of the entrance. Really, why do they bother?
I could've tried to negotiate, but why? The end result will be the same
The end result naturally has something to do with fireballs. How did I live without Fireballs?
With the Mirror Image defences gone, the two mages were vulnerable. Imoen jumped out of the shadows and planted her short sword between Rezdan's shoulder blades. It did a helluva lot of damage, but wasn't quite enough to put down the raging mage.
We split up our party to try to reduce damage done by area-affect spells that the mages could throw at us. Khalid stabbed visciously at Drasus and got him square in the neck, taking him both out of the fight and out of this world.
The leader gone, the group fell into dissaray and died soon therafter. Imoen's backstab attack proved to be very deadly.
Reiltar was behind this attack. Yet another new player to this conspiracy. The Iron Throne has given up (or run out) on using Bounty Hunters on us and are instead sending their own lackeys. Things are starting to get pretty serious now.
The mine now undefended, we entered unmolested. I had hoped that Nashkell was the LAST mine I'd have to go into.
As I said: Always kill the mouthy one.
After that guard was quickly disposed of, I sent Imoen sneaking off ahead to scout out this place a bit. This guard didn't suspect a thing.
A more important miner was standing in front of this wierd looking door. Imoen made sure the coast was clear and then spoke to him.
Destroy the mine? Well that could screw things up a bit, but it'd completely screw over the Iron Throne. Without any Iron, I guess they'd just have to be renamed to The Throne, but if they did: I think everybody would just take the piss out of them .
Oh right. I guess we should save the slaves as well.
Finished here, we progressed to the second level of the mine
We were instantly attacked by a pair of guards. Next please.
This guard didn't even put up a fight. He just ran away (Jaheira may or may not have encouraged him).
Imoen found this secret passageway hidden behind a fake wall. This should save us some time.
A Ghast patrolled the hallway. Fighting one in narrow quaters can be difficult, but that's what's so useful about ranged weapons in this scenario.
The passageway lead to this room which was the hub of level 2. I opened the door and a guard got a lucky shot off, doing a fair bit of damage.
Like I'm gonna stand for that crap. I dont know if I'm an Enchanter or if I'm a pyromaniac. Either way: Here's a simple equation.
Fireball + Center Of Room = Lots of Death.
The one survivor was this mage. I'm yet to find many mages who can withstand a fireball and 3 Magic Missiles.
We entered the room and found it decorated with charred corpses. Viconia approved of this rooms newfound decor.
We found Rill and gave him the necessary money to get the slaves out of here.
We also found Yeslick. He offered to join our group, but he comes across as a bit of a dumbass and he wasn't as good as a Cleric as Viconia. We helped him escape and in return: He told us how to flood the mine
Note: Sorry I missed the instructions. It's no real puzzle or anything like that. You didn't miss anything
We went downstairs to the third level of the mines and were greeted by this impressive collection of Hobgoblins and guards. Things were NOT looking good...
Part 2! Coming soon!