#woundwyrm

[silversiren1101]

trembling hands for Mino and Regill please. ❤️

His hands were shaking. Trembling. Why wouldn't the bleeding stop?!

The Sword of Valor was supposed to help her heal, dammit! Was she too wounded for it to help? Were they too far away? No, only a few miles out. They'd gone even farther.

"Commander!" He growled again, trying to get her to wake up. Blood wasn't just flowing around the shrapnel of her shield buried into her ribs, but down the side of her face from where the cliffside had torn them both up.

She didn't respond, eerily still with her armor hiding the small, frantic rise and fall of her chest.

And his hands continued shaking, even as he worked at the latches to her breastplate. The pain radiating up his leg was agonizing, and he knew it was more than just a clean break. Blood was starting to leak out of his greaves, just as his own breaths felt sticky and his ribs similarly radiated pain. He'd dragged her from the open to huddle against the cliffside, but if the demons found them- or that accursed woundwyrm that'd caused this - they'd be dead anyway.

If their wounds didn't get to them first.

But he banished that thought away, focusing on getting her armor loosened. He had two potions, just enough to close up the gash, if anything, but they wouldn't help with the hunk of metal wedged above her hip. He needed to tear it free first, and pray the pain woke her up enough for her to down a potion without choking. If only she'd had her adamantine plate, her actual armor, from before- her Hellknight armor. It wouldn't have crumpled so easily from the impact.

Now that she remembered, she could join them again. They could requisition her the armor she deserved - had earned a century ago and then again by defeating Nulkineth.

'You can't die here. Not like this. Not yet.'

[dailycharacteroption]

Agathiel (Vigilante Archetype)

 A classic trope among vigilantes and superheroes are the heroes that have given themselves over to a greater power, becoming who they are today because of their connection to this otherworldly force.

Today, we are looking at a group of vigilantes who have bonded with the spiritual forces of Nirvana or other neutral-good plane, drawing upon the powers of agathions.

These so-called “agathiels”, at least in the Golarion setting, have existed for centuries, the secret of their creation gleaned by the Kyonin elves and Oldmage Jatembe in order to help protect the people and reclaim land as the Age of Darkness ended.

Regardless of their history, these vigilantes draw primarily upon the animal-like physicality of most agathions, as we will see below.

 As warriors for Nirvana, agathiels must maintain a morality that is at least adjacent to neutral good in both identities, lest they lose access to their powers until such time that they atone.

A vigilante of this discipline must have a vigilante persona which evokes an animal of either small or medium size. At first, this is merely an evocative choice, but eventually, they truly turn into their chosen animal when they assume their vigilante identity. However, this animal form is always recognizable as the vigilante thanks to how their costume and equipment molds to their new form, unlike other polymorphing abilities. However, unlike other shapeshifting, they can only maintain a few aspects or abilities of their chosen animal at a time, though this improves over time. It does, however, mean that those agathiels who choose this path with a rare or esoteric ability might find it hard to fully emulate both that ability and more common abilities at the same time.

They also gain an additional aspect of the beast, either able to gain new senses or potentially additional attacks.

Honestly this archetype suffers a bit from a clear desire to not be too powerful, but it is a neat way to have a vigilante character with both a divine mandate and whose primary gimmick is turning into an animal, as well as also retaining vigilante specialization for those wising to either be an ambushing predator or mighty avenging beast. That being said, if you’d like more magic, but at the cost of a beast form that doesn’t really improve, then the avenging beast might be more your style. If the agathiel is your style, though, you can do a lot with the right combination of animal form, talents, and specialization, just remember that vigilante talents that rely upon equipment are probably a no-go on account of most forms not having hands.

 This archetype presents an interesting challenge, since after 4th level, your vigilante identity becomes an animal of some kind. This means that many tools and weapons are no longer viable for your use when on the prowl, and you’ll be mostly reliant on your natural attacks and limited special abilities. It can also be hard to articulate the reason for your activities as well, which can lead to confrontations with authority.

Additionally, it’s interesting that while they are associated with agathions, there’s nothing that limits them to the animals that published agathions are based on, perhaps hinting at a multitude of variants and unique celestial types that we never see.

  Normally content to strike against the fiend-worshipping tyranny of her drow kin, the vigilante Crimson Serpent has learned that their military has captured a woundwyrm as a living siege weapon. Such a beast is more than she can handle, but perhaps a roving band of surface dwellers exploring the Hollow World may help.

 Smarter than any other feline that walks on all fours, the White Tiger of Bellafan is something of a local legend, a mysterious big cat that appears to strike down the wicked. The authorities, when they even admit that the entity exists, insist it must be some wild animal escaped from a noble menagerie.

 Having a deep love of animals, Kriida the gathlain originally agreed to take the oath of the agathiel purely for the opportunity to transform into one for extended period, but now she has grown into a true guardian of the people, transforming into a powerful elk reminiscent of a cervinal.

[parasite-core]

So last night in pathfinder we all got our personal side quests (except Hiskaria, we learned where hers was but didn’t get to it. Instead she died. We’ll get to that.)

We started out in a fight in a hideout of Baphomet worshippers where we left off last week. Only as we went to attack, spiked chains erupted from the statue of Baphomet and a voice said that Baphomet had his fun already, now it was their turn. The chains embedded themselves into the cultists and forcefully transformed them into Kytons. Then a figured pulled himself out of the statue of Baphomet wielding a glaive at the end of a spiked chain. He referred to Melody as his cousin, then used the chains around the room to forcefully pull her in and separate her from us with a thick wall of chains. We had to fight the transformed cultists while Melody ‘danced the Dance of Macabre’ with Dirge, this being of Zon’Kuthon who claimed he wanted to ‘bring the families together’.

It was a struggle, and in the end Melody was brought down to death’s door. Dirge stepped down, and told Melody she needed to get stronger so next time she could complete their dance properly. Melody was confused because she thought he was there to kill her, but he said no, of course not, they were family after all. He healed some of her injuries, then disappeared into the wall of chains. The chains and the remaining kytons vanished. But the fighting wasn’t over. The rest of the hideout had heard the sound of combat and came to find out what was going on. Draven went toe to toe with an elemental that could suck the breath from you given the opportunity, while the others took care of the cultists who came in through the opposite door.

Then the head cultist, her eidolon, and her summoned babaus burst out of a collapsed hidden door in the status of Baphomet, and attacked Melody. Thankfully Melody dodged the attacks from the Eidolon and got out okay.

Then Hiskaria Phantasmal Killer’s the boss on a whim and ended the entire encounter because she didn’t think it would actually work, didn’t know she was a summoner and that it would remove basically every enemy in the room, but then it did 😂 So Hiskaria MVP.

A contingent of azers began fixing the temple led by The Spirit of Adoration, Shelyn’s herald himself, who greeted Melody, pleased to finally meet her. He gave Melody a boon, which unlocked knowledge within her. She wasn’t her parents’ mortal daughter—but a gift, the child of Shelyn and Desna, to the Allegro family as a final symbol of the Writ of Prosperity’s coming to fruition. Apparently the temple we’d cleansed had once been a temple of Shelyn, and was a first step on what he believed would be a journey of her leading her siblings on a glorious mission against the Worldwound demons. He wasn’t aware of the corruption of the Writ of Prosperity. When he pulled out the Writ, it was rotted and tattered. The Spirit feared the meaning of this, and even worse when he realized the Whisper of Souls may have made its way back to Kuthinite hands. He returned posthaste to Shelyn to report these findings.

We rested for the night at the temple, then headed back to town. We reported in to Irabeth, and decided to look into the rumors of a missing priest of Erastil. We followed the rumors of his erratic behavior and went to his desecrated temple where we found hints that he had gone to the tomb of a heretical former priestess who believed communities needed to remain smaller than 55 people—the 55th people would always be a traitor. The tomb was in a pit that was now filled with abyssal lava. The priest was sitting on the tomb, and said he could not made up for his actions and was going to put an end to it. Melody realized he was possessed, and began running and leaping across the field of lava to get to him in time. Luna and Draven who had fly cast on them followed after her, while Hiskaria followed at a distance, keeping him in her sights.

The possessed priest tried to make a run for the lava, but Melody grappled him and forced him still. Then she used the spell Cast Out to push the demon from his body. It was a Shachath, which cursed us for taking away its ‘fun’ by not being a captive audience for its ‘suicide’. Now it would have to kill us and wait for someone else.

Instead we fought it, until it was weakened to the point of fleeing. It teleported away. Only to be chomped up by the Woundwyrm while we were ascending the cliff with the unconscious priest.

We quickly fled before the Woundwyrm could decide we looked like a second good meal.

We left the unconscious fallen priest with Irabeth to be taken care of. Then we took care of any business we had in town, and decided that next up we should take care of the raiders who had been attacking our supply lines.

We were having a difficult time making our way through a petrified forest—until Draven’s mark started acting up. Leading the way, like a compass. That was foreboding, since to their knowledge there should have only been humans in the raiding parties, not any Deskari demons. Not to mention the range of the reaction.

Still, we followed, and we came upon the raiders’ fortress. The trees were cleared out for fifty feet in all directions, and carrion was set out for the vultures to lure them in, to act as an alarm system. Anyone to approach would get them squawking.

Luna, however, had the shadows on her side. She turned invisible and appeared in front of the door without disturbing the birds. The door was barred from the inside. She decided to make a bold move, and knocked. It was answered by a scared and tired looking raider. He warned her that she should leave, because if Marhokev caught wind of her they would have no choice but to kill her. The raiders were being forced to stay here by their leader, they just wanted to leave, but they had no choice but to continue following him.

Luna assured him that she had slipped past the birds, she had the shadows on her side, and she could deal with Marhokev and much worse. She asked if he could guide her and her friends to him. He warned that if it came to a fight, the raiders would have no choice but to fight against them. She promised they would be okay. He decided to believe in her. Then a voice echoed through the fortress, asking why he had opened the door. He made a quick excuse that he thought he’d heard something, and closed it.

Luna returned and told the party there was a change of plans, they were going to save the raiders from their boss and stop the raids that way. The party agreed. Hiskaria offered to teleport Draven across the field with dimension door, while Melody used her abilities to mimic Luna’s shadowy stealth as Luna made her way back over herself. In the end we made it back to the door without alerting the birds, and the raider let us inside. Once again the voice called out in suspicion, and this time the raider told him that he’d been wrong and they did in fact have visitors.

He brought them before a large man and his pet ice drake. The man, Marhokev, immediately locked eyes with Draven and took interest. Draven’s mark was burning. He referred to them as kin, and said he’d never met another with Lady Jerribeth’s blood before. Draven was extremely confused, saying he had to be mistaken. Marhokev said that no, not literally. But they had both made a wish, had they not? He asked Draven what he had wished for. Draven had no idea, although he was beginning to have a dawning realization. Marhokev laughed, realizing Draven didn’t remember. He told Draven about himself, that his family had lived in Mendev for generations, and he’d been stuck bearing demonic taint in his blood as a result. It had made him volatile, angry, and he’d had a difficult time making anything of himself in his own. Then Lady Jerribeth had come to him, and he jumped at the opportunity. He wished for power, and then he had it. Now he was unstoppable. But it sounded like when Draven was given the same opportunity he chosen to be weak. Still, he spread his arms wide and offered to Draven that he could join him. Draven refused, drawing his blade. Talking time was over.

Marhokev raged, turning into a twisted demonic form and going completely mindless in the process. Hiskaria turned and began firing on the drake—literally with scorching ray on her arrows. At the same time Melody took the matter of the other raiders in a…creative direction.

She decided to fascinate them. She began dancing. And she managed to keep it up for the entire round necessary without her concentration being broken, dodging attacks and keeping up concentration checks when she was hit, her beautiful ballet dance enthralling the raiders and taking them out of the combat.

Draven was in a slugfest with Marhokev. The barbarian was bouncing off his shield like a moth off a window, but Marhokev was healing with his rage powers more quickly than Draven could damage him (Draven isn’t a big damage dealer, he’s the tank and the healer, his damage output is minimal unless he crits). After Luna finished off the drake she and Hiskaria took some good hits on the barbarian. He lunged forward to try to hit Melody to snap his men out of their stupor, and when he did Draven went to stop him in his tracks—and put Radiance through his heart instead.

Marhokev fell to the ground. Melody finished her dance with a flourish. All was finished. Or it should have been. In his final moment, Marhokev’s marked hand ripped itself free of its socket and grapped Draven by the throat, crushing his trachea. He was knocked unconscious immediately. Melody was able to pry the strangling hand off of his neck, but the damage was already done—a second mark of Deskari had opened on Draven’s throat were the hand had grabbed. They healed Draven back to consciousness and explained what had happened, and what was now on his neck. Draven was not in the best of moods, being marked a second time, especially in such a noticeable place. He and Hiskaria are neck scar buddies. He’s going to probably take her up on the offer of a scarf, although he’s currently wearing a bandage around it. But that’s very constricting and he doesn’t like it.

As they went through Marhokev’s things, they found an unholy symbol of Baphomet with Lady Jerribeth’s name carved in it in abyssal. When Draven held it he felt strangely calm and at peace. When he realized this he threw it across the room and said they needed to sell it to the church to destroy it. He also got a nat 20 on a will save right afterwards that I am soooooo curious about. He really *really* should have had someone do a spell craft check on it and I’m going to roll an intelligence check when he’s calmed down a little to see if he thinks to ask Hiskaria or Arushelae about it but that just made him very uncomfortable and he wanted nothing to do with it at the time.

Speaking of Arushelae. While we were sleeping at the raider’s place, Luna got a dream from the risen Succubus, giving us her location and the fact the bounty hunters were in her tail. She told Luna she was the one who had saved her as a teen, and she was looking forward to meeting her.

Luna woke us all up violently that morning and told us we were going because we had to move it, we had to get to Arushelae ASAP. Upon hearing what Luna had to say, we were in agreement. Draven prepared marching chant to help us move double time, and we made our way.

It would have been an easy straight shot two day travel.

Except the Woundwyrm decided to come out and play.

It swooped down and breathed entropic acid on us before we knew what was happening. Suddenly we were burning in acid and two of us were confused. Thankfully the confusion only lasted for one round.

Unfortunately it only lasted for one round because after that the Wyrm was sucking us into its gullet. Melody went straight into its stomach, while Hiskaria and Draven ended up right up in its face. Luna had been farther back and just ended up pulled forward.

Luna flanked it and began laying in, Draven activated Holy on Radiance and also went on the offensive. Hiskaria did something new for her and did a regular touch attack since she was right in its face. Chill touch went off, infusing it with negative energy.

In the wyrm’s stomach, Melody used a mythic point to cast Spiral Descent and teleported out, escaping safely.

In the air, we decided since Melody was out and we were doing good now, we might as well finish slaying the dragon since it had been so kind as to come to us. Hiskaria pulled a cool maneuver when the Woundwyrm got a nat 1 on its swallow attempt in which she landed and forced its mouth to stay opened with her bow drawn pointing into its throat. Then she blasted it, Luna chopped at it, and Melody finished it off with a Dragoon leap in the air, skewering it.

And then we discovered its hoard was in its stomach. So now we’re loaded up on dragon gold and platinum~

Once we finished shoving everything in both our bags of holding, we continued our way to trying to save Arushelae. With a boon—Melody and Draven had gained a mythic rank since they both defeated the Woundwyrm and completed their personal quest. Luna, we figured, was likely just around the corner since she had a personal connection to Arushelae. Which leaves Hiskaria and the strange metal creature roaming around attacking our scouts.

We arrived to the place from Luna’s dream. Outside were two drakes with incubus riders, who hadn’t noticed us yet. Luna went invisible and teleported up behind them on the wall. From that vantage point she was able to see strange maggot monsters infesting the courtyard below, unable to get into the tower above which seemed to be warded—apparently where Arushelae was barricaded.

Hiskaria hasted is then ran from cover to get into position to start firing. Luna attacked the drake’s rider. Draven ran from cover and shot an arrow of law at the incubus as well—since historically he’s had really good luck with that spell and incubi. Unfortunately this one didn’t immediately merc him like it did the last one. Melody climbed onto the wall and began stabbing at the maggot creatures below.

Then a large hag, a huge bladed spider, and a buzzing swarm summoning insect demon appeared. The hag went invisible after noting that Xanthir Veng had been right that we would show up to try to save the risen succubus. One incubus rider fell to Luna. The huge spider could smell Luna even though she was invisible and went after her. The drakes and the remaining rider went after Draven and Hiskaria, as did a number of summoned swarms of hornets. The incubus dispelled Draven’s haste and good hope, while the riderless drake took a snap at him.

Hiskaria took out the second rider and the drake nearest her. The one nearest Draven fled farther into the facility to wait for a better opportunity to strike, surviving an attack of opportunity for Luna and avoiding one from Draven that would have forced it to quit moving.

Draven went after the swarm summoning insect—as Luna was invisible and he couldn’t see how badly she was hurt. Melody was trying to get See Invisibility off to see the hag, but she failed her concentration check while the maggot creatures were harrying her. Luna was invisible, injured, had some kind of rot taking hold of her, and then the spider ripped away her armor. She had a choice—flee and try to heal, or take a gamble and try to take it out in one final flurry of attacks. She chose the later. She hit three times, one was a crit, the spider died and then some. Luna lived to see another day.

Hiskaria was less lucky. She decided to try the trick she’d used on the summoner on the insect—Phantasmal Killer. It succeeded on its save. And it had telepathy. So it reflected her spell back at her. She failed her will save. She surged—it failed. She failed her fortitude save by too much to surge.

Hiskaria saw a visage of one of her friends who’d died in the accident she’d caused, reach out and pull a reactor core from her chest where her heart should be. “It *was* your fault.” He told her. And then she felt her body disintegrating like theirs had.

Her last words were “I know.”

What Draven and Melody saw was just Hiskaria cast a spell, and then the insect reflect it back and Hiskaria go rigid, before collapsing dead.

“And once again someone you care about succumbs to the embrace of death, Commander Imani,” the demon buzzed at Draven as he looked on in horror, barely processing the demon’s taunting words that normally would have cut so deep.

He had to hurry.

He leapt from the wall, ignoring as the insect’s stinger drove into his back. He stumbled and ran to Hiskaria’s side and swore at her that she had better have been right.

Because some time back, she’d told him that maybe he could use the wardstone’s mythic power to bring back the dead, even though he wasn’t a strong enough caster to use resurrection magic yet. So he empowered his strongest healing spell with his mythic power and tried to heal her, and tried to do the impossible and pull her back from death with his cure critical wounds. And it worked.

She opened her eyes.

Draven was crying and he could have kissed her if he didn’t have more self control and a battle to fight and a lot of other reasons not to too. But he definitely hugged her tightly when the battle was over because he almost lost someone important to him again.

Just then, however, it was time for some pest control. Draven and Hiskaria teamed up on the insect demon, and between Draven’s holy sword and Hiskaria’s arrows and spells, they finally got rid of the thing.

At the same time, the hag had broken through the barrier surrounding the tower Arushelae was in. The risen succubus had been raining arrows down on the battlefield this entire time on our enemies, but now she was having to fight up close with the hag. And holding her own quite well honestly. Melody climbed her way up into the tower and Luna teleported in, appearing invisible behind the hag. Draven was just flying Hiskaria over the tower wall when the hag’s head was sliced clean off. Because Luna’s the executioner, bitch.

We all convened in the tower and did some major healing. Then when the forbiddance was put back up we all minus Hiskaria convened in the tower because unfortunately her alignment is still NE so she had to wait outside, because her penances weren’t complete. We hung out by the door to keep talking to her.

Arushelae caught up with Luna some, and when asked why she’d saved her as a teen, she said it was a long story that would be easier to show all of us in a dream. She’d found bracers in this tower that let her share dreams with others, so if we went to sleep, she could give us a vision. It’s how she’d given Luna the location of this place.

She also gave Luna a boon, helping with her intelligence—something Luna liked because it helped with her assassination abilities.

After going to sleep, they did indeed dream. They dreamed of Arushelae’s time before, when she was a true succubus, and she’d fed upon a cleric of Desna whom she’d spent many years getting close to and toying with before finally feeding on her in a night of passion. She’d in a moment of curiosity decided to see what the dying woman was dreaming of, as succubi don’t dream. So detected thoughts on the woman, and delved into her dreams. She was charmed by the strange wonders of the dreamscape. Then she tried to leave when she’s had enough—but she couldn’t. The connection had been severed, and she was trapped in a dying woman’s mind. And in the sky of the dream the stars formed a butterfly mask. Desna’s eyes looked down upon the demon who had drained the life from her cleric. There was anger there. But also curiosity, because Arushelae had done something no other of her kind ever had—she’d shown curiosity for the land of dreams, and felt wonder for what lie within it. Desna reached out, and reawakened the remnants of the human soul that made up Arushelae’s being.

All at once she felt human emotions once again. That by itself should not have been enough to change her—as a mortal she had been deemed someone for to become a demon in the afterlife after all. But something about this turn of events changed her. She felt a terrible remorse for what she had become. And Desna saw this in her, and sent her back to the waking world. There she saw the body of the woman she had killed, and she wept, for now she knew she had come to have feelings for her in her time in this temple.

Then other demons came not long after, and when she went to disguise her new form as her old self, she found she had new power, far greater than what she had before—she’d had a mythic awakening. Over time she struggled with understanding her new nature as she continued to exist within the demonic armies.

Then one day when she was with a contingent of demons they spotted a group of children leaving Kenabres by themselves with no protection. Easy pickings. Arushelae was frozen in indecision as the demon swooped down and attacked. By the time the crusaders fought off her demonic companions there was only one survivor—Luna, as a small child. The time she blamed herself for the deaths of all the other children, when she tried to help them to escape Lady Salzala’s clutches.

Many years later, she saw an older Luna, throwing herself alone into the Worldwound. Her demonic companions goaded her that she hadn’t had some fun in a while, she should have this one. She went to Luna and asked her why she was out here. Luna said she just wanted to die. Arushelae told her she shouldn’t stop fighting, that she needed to survive to get back at those who had hurt her. Arushelae turned around and killed the demons who had goaded her on. Then she told Luna that she promised to see her again someday, and made a pinky promise on it.

After that she threw herself into acting as a spy against the demonic forces in earnest—until she was caught by Stauton Vaughn and jailed in the basement of Citadel Drezen. There she began scratching butterfly sigils into the cells and praying to Desna—and by luck and a prayer a worked, the anti magic field went down, and she escaped and fled into the wastes.

And so we left off, the next day, planning our next move. We know because of Arushelae where Xanthir Veng and the Ivory Labyrinth are. We would also like to take care of the metal monster which is confirmed to be a mechanical creation from Numeria. But first we plan on heading back to Drezen to resupply. And Draven wants to get some information from Nurah.

[wanderingmoonsword]

Pazuzu

Sometimes it’s hard to follow up behind someone who’s done so many awesome articles on many of the same monsters. @dailybestiary’s thoughts and seeds on Pazuzu are quite extensive. So rather than spend too much time on his place in Pathfinder or his appearances elsewhere in the game line, I’m going to dig in a different direction with the origins of the name. Like many of the well-known demons and devils, Pazuzu’s name is an ancient one, stretching back in this case to ancient Assyria. Embodying the southwest wind, the bringer of famines and dry seasons as well as locusts – elements that are picked up later on – his appearance in mythology is something right out of a bestiary. The head of a lion or dog crowns him, with the talons of an eagle and a scorpion’s tail as well as two pairs of great, feathered wings. Despite his monstrous appearance and powers, Pazuzu is almost welcome, for his great enmity with Lamashtu goes long back in history, driving her off and protecting newborns and new mothers.

That ambiguity, the sense of turning evil against evil, strikes straight to the core of Pazuzu. He’s the demon lord who wants to deal, who wants to give you what… because that’s the way he can get what he wants: You. Pazuzu isn’t concerned with the great rivalries of the Abyss, in or out of the plane. Pazuzu has done business with devils and yugoloths, and no doubt with gigas, asuras, rakshasas, and more. All he wants is your innocence, your soul, and in the end, you’ll give it to him to win some fleeting wish, because you were foolish enough to call Pazuzu up from the Abyss. This is a being who has been around a long, long time, one who collects antipaladins as a pastime, and one who has clashed with a powerful and deadly goddess time and again without being slain. All that flies with wickedness in its heart answers to him, and those on the wing who attempt to harm him must overcome their own will being hurled against them. Sup with a long spoon if you must dine with Pazuzu – one so long you never sup at all.

Tieflings marked by Pazuzu’s influence or blood are sometimes more like sylphs than demon-spawn, invested with the power of the wind and marked with feathers at their shoulder blades or strangely elongated fingertips. These wind-kissed tieflings inherit the dark and hungry aspect of the wind from their forefather and are often restless wanderers or dangerous innovators, never content at rest. Many of them come about when he is invoked to drive off Lamashtu when she would devour mother, child, or both in her nightmares and monsters.

Pazuzu’s relations with dragons, be they corrupted woundwyrms, rift dragons, or beings more mortal in origin, are always fraught with tension, for the King of the Wind Demons and dragons both are proud and powerful. Dragons with interests or even lairs in the Abyss who fail to exercise due care often find that Pazuzu maneuvers opponents to face them, bending wishes against them or arranging matters so adventurers find their lair, even going so far as to offer aid to one party or another in the conflict he orchestrates. Of course, there’s a price to his assistance. There’s always a price to pay.

Alarm rides the winds and zephyrs of the Plane of Air when Pazuzu begins a courtship of the mythic djinn vizier Hyzyla Zekan, offering her gifts plucked from the most beautiful places of the Abyss and whispering sweet promises into her ear. The King of the Wind Demons has an interest far beyond the carnal, of course. He hopes to gain more mastery of the very nature of the wind itself, causing every breeze to bear his name in whispers and to corrupt the very essence of the air to be of his nature, gaining vast power in the bargain.

Fierce and violent worshippers of Pazuzu, one of the tribes of Aiwran keeps fiendish hippogriffs as mounts, raiding and pillaging on the wing and hurling javelins and spells down upon the helpless land-dwellers below. (The need to defend themselves has made Aiwranianarchers much in demand, both at home and abroad, as well as encouraged a brisk business for dwarven excavators.) Riders who displease Pazuzu often find themselves bucked from their mounts, safety lines come mysteriously undone, left to tumble helplessly to earth. Their face is inevitably intact after the fall but their mount tears out their heart to devour.

- Tome of Horrors Complete 187-188, Lords of Chaos 23, and Bestiary 4 50-51

Build those tieflings in the first seed as sylphs, swapping out their automatic and bonus languages for those of tieflings.

One last thought before I leave Pazuzu and find some place far from his windy skies to take shelter: This is the figure who tore the wings from the humbaba in rage. I'm sure there's some mileage to be had in exploring their relationship.

[silversiren1101]

🍓 mino!! moro!!

For both the ladies!

Mino is already known to be terrified of ghouls and other bitey undead, but she also is afraid of falling. Not specifically heights, but falling. She had a really tough time getting to the tower where the Woundwyrm fight is.

Morolai meanwhile has a fear of drowning! She never learned how to swim and is too arrogant to now. Hanspur is one of the few gods she actually pays sincere deference to because of it. I like to think Hanspur also gives her *slight* favor because one of his anathema is to aid daemons or the Horsemen, and she did manage to pull Vordakai away from his worship of Charon (to her instead lmao).

[silversiren1101]

🥊: best part of combat? worst part of combat?, 🛡: favourite build, or party setup?, ❤️: any npcs you liked, or even wished you could romance?

🥊: best part of combat? worst part of combat?

So I actually love combat in these games, lol, but I do have specific enemies that I just loathe encountering and specific encounters that are just trash.

The stuff with the woundwyrm is just not fun no matter how much you prebuff. Getting caught on the openworld map and all you can do is run around until she flies away and hope no one dies just sucks. Threshold is just terrible at the end with all the gallu stormcallers. Vavakias in general are horrible enemies that pierce through fear resistance?!

Still, I love when a custom build just comes together. I'm playing on Challenging right now and the early levels are wrecking my shit but I'm pushing through. Feels like solving an ultimate puzzle.

🛡: favourite build, or party setup?

My ideal party!

Minovae: Fighter 20/ HK 4/ Bard 16. Shield bash based two-weapon fighter with ridiculous AC, a gazillion attacks, and her bard song to keep her friends up and fighting. LOTS of teamwork feats to wreck house with her beloved.

Regill: HK 2-3/Fighter rest of the way. Depends on how I'm feeling for the specific build. Regardless he's full armor feats, dex to attack and damage hooked hammer for a million attacks. LOTs of teamwork feats for the same reasons above!

Nenio: Wizard 10/Loremaster 10. Fully into maxed out illusion school DCs and spell favoritism on Weird and Phantasmal killer. Mythic feats buffing the shadow schools since they're evocation/conjuration but count as Illusion and thus used her maxed DCs.

Daeran: Oracle 20. No reason to multiclass him he's VERY good as is. Give him extra mystery of Bones for Bone Armor to make him tougher, focus on Conjuration and Necromancy. Ultimate undead slayer (that map with all the Bodaks on it? Or the room with Kestoglyr? DESTROYED), and also some juicy extra damage from some of the offensive necromancy spells and saves. You can lean a little into summons too with this if you like!

Arueshalae: Skald 20. Yes I use the respec mod on her, but skald fully fits her personality and story and being able to give all of my martials Pounce is so amazingly strong and hilarious. Mostly focused on buffing and rage songs. Give her Sense Vitals and have her use a starknife for full flavor.

Wenduag: So many builds for her... whether it's the Cult Leader War Priest or Rowdy Rogue or Demonslayer Ranger though... she's always rocking the dual throwing axes. Unstoppable war machine. Beloved beloathed. Never not a party pillar.

❤️: any npcs you liked, or even wished you could romance?

LET ME KISS A HELLKNIGHT OKAY IT CAN BE REGILL OR YAKER IDGAF BUT I WANT THAT BLACK ARMOR RATTLING ABOUT SOME QUAKY KNEES.