Chapter 2 - Getting to the bottom of it?

[Chris1234]

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Sound carries quite a way in the sewers but that's a reasonable compromise.
With his super-nimble feet (High Speed) Jim could always scout ahead and return to ~50' each round.
Who will carry the Stone of Direction?

[Nocturno]

Sue will leave with Woody. Also if Woody wants the sewer map, he will hand that to him also.

[Squirrellord]

Jim will scout ahead keeping pace with his friends around 50 feet behind him. "Good thinking on the light Sue" He will head off with the coin covered in a closed fist.

In case you need it
Perception: [1d20+6] = 16+6 = 22

[Chris1234]

Light concealed, Jim moves 50' ahead of Woody and Sue.
While mapping Woody can manage, at best, an ordinary walking pace. [Speed 30']
Sue guards Woody and also tries to be rearguard.

Jim proceeds into the lightless passage, air breathable but a terrible stench seems to pervade the network.

Sewer.png (1.16 MiB) Viewed 8730 times

The passage is twelve feet across with a single three-foot-wide ledge on the easterly side. The walls, ceiling and floor are all masonry and the ledge is covered in debris deposited over the years*. Most of the masonry surfaces are covered in a thin sheen of slime. The echoing water flow produces lots of noise**. Passing numerous pipes of less than one foot in diameter that discharge foul slurry and pungent albeit life-giving air, after two hundred feet*** Jim sees something blocking his further progress along the passage. It’s a five foot high grey barrier, toadstools, mushrooms, weird fungi, linked by filaments that thicken into a substantial mycelium. Sewer liquids still flow underneath the mass of fungal growth.

What next?

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*DifficultTerrain
**Disadvantage on Perception checks based on sound
***Distance travelled is approximate and based on the pace (two steps) being 5’

[counterkid]

Once Woody and Sue catch up to Jim Woody will say after seeing the slime.
"Do you want to try burning this slime. I can cast firebolt at it. We can also pour a flash of oil on it before I light it up."

[Nocturno]

"Fire probably shouldn't be our first option in this small area. Can you make one of your fancy hands to take a coin or some item to see if this barrier is harmful?"

[Squirrellord]

Here is the disadvantaged check for Perception: [1d20+6] = 2+6 = 8

At the fungal barrier Jim quietly agrees with Sue's assessment of Woody's strategy. "Fire is probably not our best option down here... It seems the sewage can flow beneath it. Not that I want to, but one could always try to go under..."

OOC - This passage is a dozen feet across and the fungal barrier is 5 feet high. How much room is between the top of the barrier and the top of the passage?

[Chris1234]

The roughly cylindrical pipe that the group are in is approximately twelve foot in diameter.
It has a flattened area in the middle of the roof and also, presumably, in the floor beneath the water channel.
The 3 foot ledge on the east side, along which the group are traveling, is covered in a fungal mound (as is the rest of the pipe)
to a height of about five foot. That leaves about seven foot between the top of the barrier and the ceiling. No one has gone closer than fifty feet so the depth of the barrier can be seen to be at least ten feet. From this distance they is no change in the air.
The liquid running sluggishly along the bottom of the sewer is dark and murky. its depth cannot be seen.

Perhaps going closer to the barrier would reveal more. Or using the magical Light rather than peering into the pitch darkness. Or just wait and see if anything happens.
Jim did think he'd caught a glimpse of a something narrow, maybe a game trail,weaving through the barrier on the walkway but has now lost sight of it. Or perhaps it was just wishful thinking.

[counterkid]

Woody will cast light on he staff. "My ray of frost might be a spell to cast slime.

[Nocturno]

"Well let's see how deep it is, and how it reacts to your magic hand."

[Chris1234]

Woody casts Light on the top end of his staff, ending the Light spell previously cast on Jim's coin.
The tip of Woody's staff now sheds a bright light for twenty foot in all directions (and then dim light for twenty foot similarly).

Jim is about fifty feet from the fungal mass and Woody stands just behind Jim.
On casting the light, the fungal mass can no longer be seen. (The Light ends about ten foot from the nearest edge of the area of fungus.)

What next?

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If not in a rush there is no problem if Jim and Woody want to exchange position (marching order) on the three foot wide ledge.

[counterkid]

"Jim let me get ahead of you for now."

Woody will move forward 10 more feet. "He will cast mage hand and move the hand in the fungal mass if he can see it. What happens?

[Chris1234]

Woody moves forwards about ten feet and the limits of the dim light just shows up the first few inches of the fungus - it's actually grey and brown.
He casts Mage Hand which has a range of thirty feet. It can only reach to halfway through the dim light area and is ten feet short of the fungal mass.

[counterkid]

Woody moves forward 10 more feet. Mage hand has a range of 30 feet but you are correct, it can only get to half way through the dim light. Anything happens? Woody used the mage hand to touch the fungus.


"Jim are you there?"

[Chris1234]

Assuming Woody overtook Jim then if Jim hasn't moved, he's 10' behind Woody.