So a campaign came to an end a few weeks ago. Pathfinder Second Darkness. The "good" guys triumphed, but at great cost. In the end it was a massive team effort and removing any cog from that machine would have likely snatched a hard won victory from our grasp, but a special shout out has to go to my main man, level 10 Illusionist cohort Muicadem ( Moo for short, though he HATED that ). This little scrapper was the guy that made it all possible. Using 3 level 1 Ray of Enfeeblements, he crit strength drained some giant snake demon of 22 Str turning what would have been a huge drain on resources right before the final showdown into a single turn joke as the demon greater teleported out after getting a hard beat down, then after the big bad girl had Disjunctioned us all and even our mono build 2 handed fighter couldn't land a blow. He beats her killer SR and takes away 11 Str, some grapples and Paladin beat downs later after she Heals/Teleports twice, he beats her SR again only this time he crits the hit for 20 Str drain. With the Paladin and his young dragon mount able to pin and smite her my double cursed rogue finally managed to get to the final glyph and we shut the whole operation down.
There were fallen comrades to mourn, the PC wizard who teleported away from all of us to escape minor damage, only to be surrounded and cut down just hours before our final assault.
Our two-handed fighter, who refused to change tactics and try anything but to hit the BBEG with full attacks, who fell to a blade barrier and was diced into hundreds of pieces.
Our Paladin, who also took a blade barrier to the face, but luckily I had a scroll of Raise Dead ready to bring him back and finish the fight. ( Though he is still slowly dying from his exposure to the Black Blood, even with his supernatural saves he has at best a few years left )
The monk, who replaced the PC wizard almost died twice, once from succumbing to drow poison, and then again trying to toe to toe the big bad.
Finally there was my Cleric ally, who followed me because she thought her patron Cayden Cailen had something in mind. Her body was consumed completely, nothing left to bring back, not that she would have wanted that anyway.
So now I bid farewell to my charming smart mouth rogue, his allies dead or dying. His outlook on life violently shifted, yet for the better. The paladin will want to hunt down the remaining drow, plus the few demonic loose ends that we didn't clean up using whatever time he has left . Moo will probably go with him, not out of any desire to see the world saved, but because he was promised the PC wizards gear and didn't get it. If anyone has the patience to listen to that mouthy little wizard extol his own virtues it would be the paladin. But "Twitch", he has his own scores to settle. I can see him seeking out a few more of those "Drow disguise" scrolls and heading back down, while humming "This Town", (Destroy MY hat will you?). Or just throwing his Haversack on his back and walking off towards the horizon.
Kingmaker next, and I'm either looking at a racist Elven Ranger, or a bookish, irritable Human Wizard depending on what the party needs. Not much actual "meat" to this post, but after a year it was nice to see the adventure to its completion, even nicer to have pulled a win out when the GM didn't pull any punches, in fact he said he went back into the book and re-statted her / changed her spell selections to make what he thought she should have.
