The sequel to the previous impact oneshot (MASSIVE SPOILERS)

Overview

Ol' Hieronymus is up to something with the gold shipment that the PCs delivered last time. It's been a few months since the last oneshot and, the Theridiae is back in town with another shipment, and some passengers from Lorrokan. He's going to hold a party in his old-ass rickety mansion, but the Theridiae's captain feels like something's off. Getting absolutely rotten vibes from the passengers.

The passengers are all old elven royalty, known to Thalandir (eoin) but no-one else this far west. Not the top of the top, more uncles and cousins looking for a leg up and something impressive to show the queen. They're here at the request of Hieronymus, who purports to be able to show them Laravin's Hope. In fact, the devil (perhaps the Arbiter?) who told him this was lying and it'll just open a hell portal, which is bad.

This oneshot has three phases:

1. Get into the gathering (disguise, sneak, bust down the doors, anything else)
2. Discover and accesss the secret basement of the mansion
3. Stop the ritual (combat)

Phase one

So the PCs have met back up in the saloon, but this time it's with Gavin Segal, the captian of the Theridiae. This time his main cargo's been a delegation from the Royal Court of Lorrokan, though he doesn't know that. He think's they're a bunch of weird elves. He's also overheard that they're going to more or less immediately hole up in Hieronymus's mansion up on top of the bluff. Based on their rotten vibes, he wants the PCs to investigate and make sure that the town is kept safe; this is also based off elvenkind's general reputation for magical fuckery.

Hieronymus also invites some notable townsfolk, as relayed by Gavin:

• Ramon Hernandez: A somewhat infamous travelling preacher and evangelist of the church of Lathandar. Invited to give the god's blessings to the gathering (and the planned ritual).
• Perrin Hearthstone: The town's resident reclusive wizard, a dwarf. Invited under false pretenses of assisting with a few old enchantments (magic mouths and stuff) in the basement, actually in order to be coerced into performing the ritual by threatening his apprentice and protege, Alice.
• Xandar Fetterman: A raven chieftan, invited under the pretense of mending relations and possibly trading (especially since the ravens gave Geronimo lots more respect in light of the events of the previous oneshot). Actually there to act as hired muscle/a meat shield.
• Vince Thorne: Manager of the biggest general store of the town. He's reasonably wealthy by Geronmio standards and in on the plan since the beginning.
• Sheriff Rick Lockjaw: Invited because he's the sheriff; for the same real purpose as Xandar. Also, the arbiter's day happens to fall on the day they're in the house - it's a full moon rising.

(Some of these are reused names, they aren't the same characters as in the docs for the previous oneshot.)

The man himself appears at the end of Gavin's explanation to deliver Sheriff Lockjaw's invite, then it's off to the races.

Oh, and this gathering also coincides with Geronimo's yearly massive rainstorm. Gavin himself needs to head off to get ahead of it.

Getting into the party

Obviously the PCs have one invite - but it specifically asks for no guests to be present.

The house has this energy

Options they can take to get in:

• Disguise themselves as one of the attendees (Particularly Tal, who could easily pass as an elven noble.)
• Sneak in a back entrance. There are a few options here:
  • Discover an entrance to the basement via a secret tunnel or something. There's at least a few, but none of the PCs know about them; they'll have to investigate.
  • Sneak into the mansion proper - their only option to the top of the bluff is to sneak up the staircase or go all the way around, a half day's walk and climb at least.
• Blast down the doors - they're guarded by four statues, two flanking the portico and two flanking the door itself. (see living statue)
• Anything else they think of (players are quite good at thinking of extra things)

Phase two

Once the PCs are inside the house, it quite quickly becomes clear that some nefarious shit is going on. If they come out in the basement, they pretty much immediately discover some very ritual-looking stuff - inscribed circles, random spell components lying around, a shitload of candles, that kind of stuff.

As for the party, it goes on for a few hours, with the ritual itself taking place at midnight on the night of the full moon. Milling around gets the players info about what the intended purpose of the ritual is - a portal to Laravin's Hope, as well as the reasons for the presence of the various characters. In any case, Hieronymus makes an announcement pretty close to midnight, declaring that it's time, and asking everyone to follow him downstairs to the basement.

If the PCs try to enter the basement early, there are magic mouths and signs up to warn of traps and other hazards in the basement without proper authorisation. There are more living statues, as well as some gorgons pretending to be statues and a few helmed horrors.

Should the PCs actually enter the basement, Xandar and Perrin both become hostile, as well as a few of the elves (xandar's an appropriate CR human enemy, everyone else can be a mage). Should they fight in the basement, they desparately try to open the portal before the appointed time passes, and Rick becomes posessed and aids them.

If they manage to kill or incapacitate everyone before midnight, the arbiter shows up anyway and opens the portal, expressing his profound disappointment in Rick and Hieronymus

Phase three

Once the portal is open, a whole bunch of hell monsters come flooding in. Big fight, in an underground cathedral type arena, with thunder and lightning happening in hearing range

Monsters:

• a chain devil
• two merregons
• five or six imps if it's too easy

Also, because of all the rain, the basement starts to flood.