Saturday night dungeon: The Warrior Halls

Time for another quest blog!

This time, our group entered the second quest of Kellar's Keep: the Warrior Halls. Our female elf hero had bought a crossbow (which she is coincidentally actually holding) and a tool kit. She handed the barbarian the Spirit Blade, and the dwarf still held his Orcs Bane. Ready for battle, the barbarian opened the great iron door in front of him, and entered the hallway beyond.
The swift dwarf passed him in the hallway, and entered the first room. There he spotted a lonesome goblin, who he could reach with his remaining movement points. Boldly, he charged ahead... Only to fall face-first into a pit trap! The goblin grinned wickedly.
Enraged, the barbarian ran past the dwarf at the goblin... And also fell into a pit trap. The goblin could barely contain his glee.
Finally, a cool-headed female elf entered the room. She quickly assessed the situation, shook her head at the foolishness of her two male companions, and fired the crossbow straight into the head of the no longer smiling goblin.

Confident that these two brave men would get out of the traps themselves, she headed back to the second room in the corridor. Another goblin awaited her at the far side. After the dwarf and the barbarian had crawled out of the pit traps, and the dwarf had disabled one of them to assure safe passage, the elf fired another bolt at the second goblin, but missed! (Good thing nobody saw that)
The wizard meanwhile held back, still not sure which party member to follow...
The barbarian entered the next corridor, the dwarf close behind. Searching for traps this time revealed nothing. The wizard decided to follow the men, as he didn't trust the second room.
The elf shot at the goblin, who hadn't moved an inch, and killed it.

The barbarian moved around the corner of the middle corridor, and searched again, but found no traps. The dwarf decided to head the other way, and searched that part of the corridor, also to find nothing. They both did see a door on each side of the center room though, but decided to wait a little while for the elf and wizard to catch up.
The elf finally had a chance to search for traps, and noticed the ceiling was a bit unstable. She threw a rock at it, and the entire room promptly collapsed, leaving no passage. She had no choice but to follow the men's path.

Meanwhile, the barbarian got impatient, and walked up to the door, taking a peek around the corner of the corridor opposite the door. Hurray! Two skeletons awaited him at the far side. But alas, his movement points did not get him close enough. Tauntingly, he stopped one square short of the first skeleton.
The dwarf did likewise on the other side, and spotted two skeletons as well! This map was getting suspiciously symmetrical. His movement points did get him in front of the first skeleton though, so once again, he bravely and boldly charged ahead, having learned little from his last encounter. And so he triggered a spear trap, which cost him another body point. "Good thing I so prudently waited" thought the barbarian.
The bored wizard meanwhile followed the barbarian, waiting for a chance to help in this epic quest. The elf decided the dim-witted barbarian might need some help, and went his way.
The skeletons did their attacks, and in the next round the barbarian completely failed to kill his skeleton, and so backed away to give the elf a chance to shoot at it.
The dwarf meanwhile chopped his skeleton to bits. The wizard then followed the dwarf, just in case he needed some help there.
During the next round the dwarf decided it would be wise not to open the door behind the skeletons he just killed, but to head for the center room instead, which is always bad news.

The barbarian still had to deal with his 2 skeletons, the elf standing by to help. The wizard once again trailed behind the dwarf.
With sweaty hands, the dwarf opened the door on his side, and found: FOUR chaos warriors!
A general moan resounded from our heroes.
Well now, should we rush in, and risk traps, but hopefully kill one of the chaos warriors before they can react? Or should we wait for them to make the first move, while blocking the entrance?

The dwarf reasoned that he could not possibly be so unlucky as to set off ANOTHER trap, so he ran in, and attacked the warrior on his left. And fell into yet another pit trap. Some cursing sounded from the pit. He was now down to 4 body points.
The chaos warriors in the room, who now were fully aware of the intruders, did not move, but the one next to the unfortunate dwarf did attack him, but missed!
The barbarian and the elf knew they had to get rid of the skeletons quickly, or the dwarf would be in major trouble. So the barbarian crushed skeleton number one, and retreated behind the elf, to give her a chance to fire at skeleton number two, which she did very nicely. Both skeletons were no more.

The chaos warriors finally acted: one of them attacked the poor dwarf but the dwarf blocked his attack. The second warrior headed right for the wizard, who turned pale, but managed to block with his staff. The barbarian now opened the door on his side, but remained outside, not wanting to set off any more traps, waiting for the chaos warriors to make their move. The wizard found his path blocked, so he decided to attack the chaos warrior first, and if that failed, he could always try and run for cover. He swung his staff, and hit the chaos warrior right in the gonads, who promptly died. The elf managed to run up to the doorway where the wizard had killed one of the warriors, and fired her crossbow at one of the chaos warriors on the far side of the room, killing him where he stood. The dwarf attacked and killed the chaos warrior next to him, and then moved to position himself in front of another chaos warrior. This warrior would not be intimidated, and swung his axe at the dwarf, hitting him for 2 whopping points, bringing the dwarf down to 2 points. The wizard knew he had forgotten something in his last turn, and sheepishly looked at his healing spell...
The chaos warrior closest to the barbarian, moved up to greet him, and attacked. The barbarian easily blocked his attack, and on his turn, slew the monster in one stroke.

Now the elf or the dwarf were left to kill the remaining chaos warrior, or fear for the dwarf's life. The elf missed, but the dwarf managed to kill the last warrior, and let out a big *phew*.
The barbarian could now search the room, and found another pit trap and 4 spear traps, which the heroes miraculously had not set off. As it turned out, the monsters were magical, and did not set off traps, even if they passed one.
The wizard finally had a chance to heal the dwarf back to 6 body points, and our heroes set off to investigate the next room. The dwarf reached it first, and opened the door, where another goblin awaited him. He carefully stepped into the room with the goblin, hoping not to set off any more traps, and stopped at the first square, waiting for the goblin to make it's move. It didn't. The barbarian walked up behind in the corridor. The wizard, seeing that his help was once more not needed at all, waited in the corridor as well. So the elf took the initiative, and shot the poor goblin from a distance. Searching for traps revealed another cave-in. The dwarf opened the next door.

There they found 2 mummies. The dwarf carefully stepped into the room with the odd looking mummies (who were actually at home on my painting table, so we had to use a zombie and a skaven), and killed the closest one, hoping not to set off any more traps. The remaining mummy fought back, but did no damage. The barbarian swiftly killed it, allowing the wizard to be of help for a change and search the room for hidden traps. He found nothing. The dwarf decided to do a search for treasure, and found a measly 10 gold. The barbarian searched this room for treasure, and found a wandering fimir, who promptly attacked the barbarian. Just great, the barbarian thought, and took 1 point of damage. The elf shot the fimir, killing it, and once more, the wizard cowered behind her.

The dwarf was ahead again, and stepped into the next corridor, but prudently searched for traps right away. It paid off, he found 2 spear traps! The party walked through the coridor, and found the exit. But before leaving the halls, the elf wanted them to do a search of the remaining rooms first. So the barbarian searched the wide corridor adjacent to the large exit door, but saw nothing. The wizard, who was behind him, decided it was time to prove his worth, and walked into the corridor, where he was ambushed by FOUR fimir! *GASP!*

Panic attack! The wizard only had one choice: try to kill one fimir, and hope that the others could reach him in time so he could make a getaway. Using a powerfull fire magic spell, he managed to kill one fimir. The elf and dwarf stumbled over each other trying to get there in time, but only reached the start of the corridor. The fimir attacked the wizard, and the first one hit for 2 points, bringing the poor wizard down to 2. The second fimir attacked him from behind, and disaster struck as he managed to kill the wizard. Shock went through the party, and an evil laughter was heard through the corridors. (My wife, the evil dungeon mistress, was having a blast).
Stunned by the wizards demise, the barbarian shouted out his battle cry, and attacked one of the remaining three fimir, slaying it utterly. The elf shot her crossbow at another, and also shot it down.
The dwarf didn't reach the last fimir, so it attacked the barbarian, who took another point of damage.
He, in turn, skewered the last fimir, and lamented the loss of his friend.
The elf and the dwarf, intent on revenge, stormed the room on the far west side of the corridor, and found 2 zombies inside (one of who again suspiciously looked like a rat).
The party killed them without much trouble, taking minor damage, and searched the room. The dwarf, who searched for treasure, found 120 gold. The next room revealed another goblin, who took an arrow to the knee and died, and a hidden door. The dwarf once again was the first to enter, and discovered a helm on an old weapons rack.
Heavy-hearted, the remaining heroes walked to the exit door, hoping they would be ready for their next adventure.