Abomination Vaults — Campaign Wrapped

Sessions 1–64. Hundreds of hours at the table. Four heroes, one lighthouse that will not stop lighting up, and a small nation's worth of things that wanted to eat them.

The party: Veve "Veve" Hao (bard, now an oracle), Cidolfus "Cid" de Mulond (fighter), Venris "Venris" Greystone (rogue, now also a ghost-hunting spellcaster), and Abbas "Abbas" Visaegok (cleric of Pharasma). They answered a star-reader's worried summons in S1 and have been crawling deeper under Otari ever since `[S1]`.

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By the Numbers

• 64 sessions played, start to (not-quite) finish — the campaign is still going strong.
• Hundreds of hours in the chair together, across years of real time.
• ~150+ distinct fights recorded across the campaign, from mitflit skirmishes to near-TPK boss brawls.
• 7 character levels climbed — the party started at level 1 and hit level 8 in S53 (`[S53, 03:42:47]`), then kept grinding deep into the lowest vaults at that level `[S62]`.
• A whole second arm. Venris lost a hand to the foul rot `[S32]`, then bought and bolted on a clockwork prosthetic in Absalom that turns into a ghost-touch blade — and named it "Money" `[S35, 00:18:32]`.
• Thousands of mechanical events ledgered (loot, conditions, rulings, level-ups), from a +1 morning star in S1 to a unique flaming Hellforge glaive pulled from a devil's forge deep below `[S61, 03:03:26]`.
• 0 permanent PC deaths. Plenty of dying 2, dying 3, "I'm at 1 HP and fleeing," one full-blown ghoul transformation `[S14]`, one lost hand `[S32]`, and a slow-burning soul curse `[S50]` — but everyone has, so far, walked it back.

Body Count of Named Foes

The party has personally ended a long rogues' gallery of named threats:

• Skrawng, the crowned mitflit "king" — surrendered, then later put down `[S2]`.
• Roth, the tattooist ghoul boss, and the freed-then-laid-to-rest librarian ghost Gerald Caldren `[S12]`.
• Ralphus the morlock leader and his attendant Hansen — the "missionary" double-cross `[S14]`.
• The canker witch who built the flesh abomination, and the last of the ghoul bounty-hunter "bros" `[S14]`.
• The grieving "my love" ghost, finally put down with a hard truth `[S16]`.
• The "king of the ghost city" spider boss in the webbed lair `[S20]`.
• The Leech-Lord ("you cannot kill us" — they did) `[S23]`.
• The Voidglutton, Vollok's patron, in its body-filled nest `[S26]`.
• Jaul Mesman the werewolf (and his wolf-wife) `[S25]`.
• McLani, the undead founder of Otari, dissolved with help from a Marigna psychopomp `[S32]`.
• Cora Fallow Glade, Belcorra's shadow-assassin chief killer `[S44]`.
• The Executioner and a pack of Basilisks in the Cheery Man's arena `[S45, S46]`.
• Roxy, a flesh-warped Sagathi — mercy-killed by his own brother Falksy `[S49]`.
• Jafakai/Jafki, the ceiling-clinging flesh-warper boss, plus the floor's bargaining mummy spellcaster they double-crossed `[S53]`.
• Yasonkler, the denizen of Leng who wore a child's face and hid a cursed ruby — opened up and crumbled to dust `[S55]`.
• A magic-eating will-o'-wisp that was secretly a priest of Pharasma `[S55]`.
• The witchfire — a hag that Belcorra burned alive — shut down with silence and haste `[S56, 01:18:34]`.
• Corloc the Barbazu and his exploding groffleets `[S59]`.
• A Hellforge devil forge-master, a Zebub, and an Oscelus inquisitor devil in the lowest prison block `[S61]`.
• A pair of regenerating five-headed Hydras, cauterized head by head `[S62]`.

Plus a small army of un-named-but-memorable monsters: the slurk toad, a mist stalker (and an elite mist stalker on the beach later) `[S6, S47]`, a skeletal giant, a River Drake, a quill-spider, a wood golem of Belcorra, an invisible flying skull, a chair-throwing poltergeist, banquet skeletons lit by blue skull-lights, an eyeless sonic horror (a sester chan), a confusion-spamming Sagathi alchemist, exploding gibbering mouthers, goblin mimics, a living-landslide golem, and a magic-immune ghost woman who drowned a whole room in Darkness `[S55]`.

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Biggest & Hardest Fights

• The Mist Stalker (S6) — the campaign's first signature near-TPK. A corrupted water elemental far above the party's level, fought to a standstill in a fog-choked room. Multiple party members dropped to dying and were dragged back; Venris landed the final blow. The bar every later "tough fight" is measured against.
• The Blood Siphon (S9) — nearly wiped Cid solo: crit-grabbed, blood-drained, dying 3, saved by a hero point. Veve ended it by telekinetically hurling Cid's own rapier through its throat.
• The Grieving Ghost (S16) — impossible to out-damage: immune to precision, resistant to physical, healing back, and it crit for 48 damage. The party won not with numbers but by telling it the truth that its love was dead — slowing it cold.
• The Leech-Lord (S23) — a swarm-bodied spellcaster with darkness, mirror images, poison clouds, and heavy physical resistance. Veve closed it out by chucking a chair (Vile Projectile) and squishing the boss against Abbas's shield.
• The Crypt Mummy Finale (S32) — a near-TPK that needed a whole NPC support cast. Venris touched the foul cancer and lost a hand, Veve was crit-dropped, and the day was only won when a Marigna psychopomp sacrificed herself to dissolve the rot.
• The Voidglutton (S26) — Vollok's outer-god patron, fought in a nest packed with bodies, barely survived as the party hit level 6.
• The Arena Gauntlet (S45–S46) — the Cheery Man's death-matches: a solo 1v1 against the Executioner won on a last hero point, two petrifying Basilisks, a three-headed chimeric manticore, and an eyeless sonic horror that broke Venris's metal arm `[S46]`.
• The Two Invisible Bosses (S53) — a flesh-warper that clung to the ceiling and a mummy spellcaster, both invisible. Abbas's Silence muzzled the mummy but also deafened the party. They burned both down and hit level 8 `[S53, 03:42:47]`.
• The Hellforge, Hydras, and Star Glagon (S61–S63) — deep in the lowest level: a winged forge-master devil and his guards `[S61]`, two regenerating five-headed Hydras cauterized with the Hellforge glaive `[S62, 02:27:57]`, then an underwater star glagon that destroyed the folding boat before Veve crit-killed it `[S63, 03:06:30]`.
• The Witchfire (S56) — a hag Belcorra burned alive, shut down by Silence so it could never cast, with haste closing the gap; the party killed it as it tried to unleash a Phantasmal Calamity `[S56, 00:59:38]`.
• The Grave Knight chase (S56, S56–S58) — not a fight the party can win yet. An over-leveled hunter of Nimbaloth, Kalido Harovex `[S62, 00:42:36]`, who can see through invisibility and is fused to his own armor `[S59]`. The party calls him "Mr. Skeleton Hands" `[S58, 00:53:01]` and flees him through a long game of doors and teleport-circles until they can crack his armor with holy power.

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Most Memorable Lines

(Earlier quotes had no known speaker in the source, so they are cited by session; later ones carry a name. They speak for themselves.)

• "Are we the bad guys? Knowing all along that of course we're the bad guys." `[S2]`
• "Then it sounds like this guy could be our tour guide. Let's rope him and keep him on a leash like a pet." `[S2]`
• "Sometimes the healers gotta do the damage." `[S6]`
• "Venris turned into a ghoul, that was ten out of ten would not recommend." `[S14]`
• "The coin has spoken." `[S14]`
• "There's a door behind a door and now there's two doors." `[S15]`
• "The children yearn for the mines." `[S19]`
• "Are you not entertained?" `[S27]`
• "I'm gonna call the spirit Britney." `[S31]`
• "Weapon is gonzo. It's not broken. It's gonzo." `[S32]`
• "What's the name of your arm? ... It's called Money." `[S35, 00:18:32]`
• "The seventh floor of the abomination vaults is just Brazil." `[S36, 03:13:38]`
• "Worst case scenario, we kill him again." `[S37, 04:00:54]`
• "It's been inside our room for five hundred years, baby." `[S38, 03:04:24]`
• "This is Bob. He works in accounting." `[S42, 01:53:53]`
• "The fucking plushie made of diamonds!" `[S49, 06:13:42]`
• "Nice knowing you V. See you next life." `[S50, 02:17:38]`
• "The smell of victory through retreat." `[S56, 03:44:43]`
• "Dude, we love doors. Doors are overpowered." — Venris Greystone `[S56, 03:14:27]`
• "I practice medicine, not psychology." — Abbas Visaegok `[S56, 01:13:50]`
• "Guys, guess what? We have rocks, I have fire, and I can generate water." — Veve Hao `[S57, 00:56:28]`
• "Hello there. Mr. Skeleton Hands." — Cidolfus de Mulond `[S58, 00:53:01]`
• "We traded a 500 GP boat for a 150 GP item." — Venris Greystone `[S63, 03:12:19]`
• "The runes will light up. And the door begins to open." `[S64, 04:14:33]`

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MVP Moments — One Per Hero

Veve "Veve" Hao (bard, now oracle). The thrown-object specialist nobody saw coming. She beheaded the blood siphon by telekinetically launching Cid's rapier through its throat `[S9]`, and she's landed boss kills with furniture — the chair that crushed the leech-lord against Abbas's shield `[S23]`. When a crypt spirit possessed her, she talked it down — calming "Britney" instead of fighting `[S31]`. She dispelled the denizen-of-Leng curse on the sick child Doriana with a natural-20 counteract `[S49]`, then attuned to the cursed ruby to unlock a once-a-day spell that hunts the villain by name `[S54, 01:12:43]`. Along the way she finished becoming an Oracle of the Cosmos `[S36]`. By the late vaults she alone can sense the party through the portal network and follow them `[S58]`.

Cidolfus "Cid" de Mulond (fighter). The frontline that refuses to die quietly. He's a one-man finishing-blow machine — decapitating crits on the wood golem `[S20]` and the killing blow on the witchfire as it tried to cast `[S56]`. His holy Rosa Argentis longsword — silver, peachwood, ghost-touch — carried fight after fight in the devil levels, crit-killing the Barbazu and the Oscelus `[S61]`. Best trick: he doesn't only fight ghosts, he argues them down, confronting the grieving ghost with the truth `[S16]`. And even when his own player went missing, the party kept Cid swinging "by committee" `[S55]`.

Venris "Venris" Greystone (rogue, now ghost-hunter). The campaign's MVP at dying and coming back. Reduced to 1 HP by the quill-spider, then returning to land the kill `[S5]`. He turned into a ghoul and lived to regret it `[S14]`, lost a hand to the foul cancer `[S32]`, and rebuilt himself in Absalom — joining the Pathfinder Society, locking in the Ghost Hunter archetype, and bolting on a clockwork arm that becomes a ghost-touch blade `[S34, S35]`. That arm lets his sneak attacks bite incorporeal undead `[S42]`. He cracked the master-locked plinth with four thievery successes in a row `[S49]`, opened the denizen of Leng with an Organ Sight crit `[S55]`, and is still the party's notes-and-inventory keeper carrying the relic key and the Lantern of Empty Light `[S58]`. Also the resident loot-skimmer (more below).

Abbas "Abbas" Visaegok (cleric of Pharasma). The "giga heal" man and the party's moral compass. His positive-energy Heal does murderous damage to undead, and he held the graveyard line solo with Divine Lance `[S4]`. He destroyed a 230 gp necromantic staff on principle `[S14]`, cured Venris's diseases and soul-rot more than once `[S38, S50]`, and became the party's lore lead — reading the Whispering Reeds and uncovering the full horror of the "empty death" `[S50]`, then cracking the lens-lattice-fulcrum mystery of the Gauntlight beam `[S58]`. He also runs the secret check that says the Rose Guard souls aren't in the relics, flatly contradicting Otari's ghost `[S58, 04:06:07]`.

S63 adds a clean late-campaign ensemble beat: Venris dives for the submerged objective, Abbas finds and dispels the magic, Cid carries Rosa Argentis into the water, and Veve blinds then kills the star glagon. The reward is the fourth pentagram shard and a Lesser Armory Bracelet; the cost is the Greater Folding Boat `[S63]`.

S64 slows down just long enough to sharpen the next plunge. The party evades the grave knight's metal footfalls, checks on a healed but newly telekinetic Doriana, warns Carman that Uravian wants him captured alive, learns Rajani/Nidal bloodline lore from Bandy, discovers Rosa Argentis can wake the Blossom Veil near Carman, and returns to the five-pointed door. Abbas prays, casts Detect Magic, and the four-shard workaround seems to catch: the runes light and the door begins to open `[S64, 00:36:22; S64, 00:51:55; S64, 01:09:28; S64, 01:25:30; S64, 02:53:58; S64, 04:14:33]`.

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Running Jokes & Recurring Bits

• "Are we the baddies?" A genuine through-line. The party knowingly posed as servants of the Ghost Queen, roped a prisoner "like a pet," and kept profiting off corpses `[S2, S8]`.
• Venris, professional loot-skimmer. Quietly pocketed a pouch in S1, lifted Carman's ~110-gold coin sack `[S19]`, and pickpocketed a young thief in Absalom `[S34]`. He still secretly owes the blacksmith most of that money back — he only paid the mayor back 300 gp `[S36]`.
• Death by furniture (and thrown everything). Veve's whole combat doctrine: thrown chairs, sofas, and rapiers. At least two boss kills owe their lives to interior decor `[S9, S23]`, and the bit never dies — "Then I'll throw a book at the dude" `[S40, 01:19:01]`.
• Naming the horrors. "Mr. Beakers" the brownie `[S9]`, the spirit "Britney" `[S31]`, the arm named "Money" `[S35]`, and now "Mr. Skeleton Hands" the grave knight `[S58, 00:53:01]` — when in doubt, give the nightmare a friendly name.
• "We don't negotiate with terrorists." The party's go-to line whenever a monster tries to bargain its way out `[S54, 03:38:54; S54, 04:45:33]`.
• Doors are overpowered. A late-campaign discovery: half their grave-knight escapes are just opening and closing doors in his face `[S56, 03:13:07; S56, 03:14:27]`.
• Filth Fever = COVID. The table plays every plague arc straight as a pandemic bit, patient zero and all — and they keep nearly causing the next one `[S29, S38, 00:05:22]`.
• The paused cliffhanger. A table tradition: combats that run past the clock and freeze mid-board, resumed next session — the morlocks, the acid slug, the banquet skeletons, the leech in the dark, and Yasonkler reaching behind his back `[S54]`.
• The absent-player shuffle. Across the late sessions players keep going missing, so the group runs Cid (and once Abbas) by committee and keeps adventuring anyway `[S55, S57]`.

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The Threads Still Dangling

The lighthouse is still lit. Here's what the party knows it hasn't finished:

• The Gauntlight itself. Revealed as a "door" and a weapon built to raze Absalom `[S20]`. Abbas has now reverse-engineered its design — four lenses held in a "lattice" plus a fulcrum — but the lens and lattice at the top are gone, and the recovered Lantern of Empty Light is a failed copy of the same experiment `[S58, 00:38:24]`.
• Belcorra, the Lady of the Light. The Ghost Queen the cults worship, the sorcerer the Rose Guard once beat, now strong enough to be aware of the party — Venris even caught her hateful gaze through a scrying mirror `[S56]`.
• Kalido Harovex, the grave knight. "Mr. Skeleton Hands" stalks the vaults, sees through invisibility, and is fused to his armor — he can only be destroyed once that armor is breached with holy power `[S59, S58]`.
• The five-piece pentagram door. Deep in the devil levels, a sealed door to "Uravian/Aravian" needs a five-piece silver amulet; the party has four shards, and Abbas's prayer plus Detect Magic made the runes light and the door begin to open. Whether four truly works as five is the immediate cliffhanger `[S64, 04:14:08; S64, 04:14:33; S63, 03:12:41; S63, 03:12:56]`.
• The four Rose Guard relics. The party holds all four for the barrier door `[S35]` — but there's a live contradiction over whether the relics actually hold the dead companions' souls. Otari's ghost swears they do; Abbas's check says they do not `[S58, 04:06:07]`.
• Otari's failing ghost. Bound in the vaults for ~500 years and losing coherence, with hidden book pages only he can read — freed only by finding the soul-locker or severing the connection that traps him `[S58, 03:54:25]`.
• Venris's curse. He carries the soul-and-body-consuming "empty death," a mark for the outer god Nimbaloth, with no cure in the books but a way to stall the fate — the party is racing to beat it `[S50, S51]`.
• Doriana, the mayor's formerly cursed child. Her dreams, her arm-markings, and a ruby that kept reappearing inside her stuffed animals tied her to the denizen of Leng; she was freed and healed after Yasonkler died, but S64 reveals the mayor is now hiding her emerging telekinesis from the town `[S64, 00:50:30; S64, 00:51:55; S56]`.
• Veve's Absalom letter. Veve received a letter from Absalom during the S64 town errands and chose to read it later `[S64, 03:31:54; S64, 03:32:18]`.
• The way down is blocked. A Wall-of-Force-sealed elevator and tons of rubble stand between the party and a Darklands cavern far below — and the devils were summoned by Belcorra herself `[S62]`.

See you below. `[S58]`