A moment later Gerald rushed in, going for the right most Warriors with Tiny a step behind him going left. Stacia and her double followed them in, focusing on the Acolytes and singing at them. Alburet, Fluff and Karen followed after Tiny, ready to start in as soon as he had decent aggro. Bob and Marysue came in last, with Marysue moving slightly more towards Gerald as her heals wouldn’t help Tiny.
Tiny took the two he had been assigned and hit the left one three times in rapid succession, letting Demonic Vengeance build the aggro on the other one for him. As his third hit landed, Karen and Fluff joined in on it followed a moment later by Bob. As the damage started to mount the Warrior they were fighting stunned Tiny with a bash from its shield. While Tiny was stunned, it and the other Warrior delivered critical hits, taking close to a third of his life away. Marysue gasped as she watched the three Warriors on Gerald do the same thing, taking a good quarter of his life away.
Alburet winced as the other Warrior followed the first stun with one of his own, allowing another round of criticals. Gerald’s life should have dropped below half but he used his damage mitigation ability to stop a good portion of the second round of criticals. As his mitigation wore off, though, the third Gnoll Warrior stunned him again, allowing the three on him to get another round of criticals in, dropping Gerald close to half life.
Marysue seemed a little worried as she used her instant heal to bring Gerald back up to about three-fourths of his life. “Cooldown used, I hope they can’t stun for a bit,” she told the group.
Alburet silently agreed with her as they laid into the Warrior they were attacking with more vigor. Thirty seconds later it died, allowing them to switch to the second Warrior. As they did Alburet noted Tiny’s life dropping to almost a quarter, even with Demonic Vitality healing him. The group laid into the second Warrior, killing it a little over twenty seconds later. As a group they charged at the three on Gerald. Alburet refreshed Demonic Vitality on Tiny as they ran across to the other mobs.
Tiny roared, picking up one of the three Warriors, which the group focused on as Gerald sighed a little bit in relief. A few seconds later the gnolls bashed the tanks again, allowing them land yet another round of criticals. Luckily only one hit Tiny, which allowed him to live through it. The other two hit Gerald, followed by another two as the second Warrior on him followed with another stun. Gerald wheezed slightly as his life dropped to a third of its total while Marysue did her best to keep him alive.
The third Warrior dropped not long after, allowing Tiny to pull one of the remaining two off Gerald. Less than a minute later the last Warrior fell dead as Marysue chugged a mana potion. Gerald drank one of his health potions as he picked up the first Acolyte.
The Stacia who wasn’t holding the other Acolyte in a daze came charging in to help deal damage. Having less life and armor than the Warriors, the Acolyte quickly fell to the group.
“Kill the last Acolyte, we have time and it will stop any issues that might come up,” Gerald said as he attacked it.
The others joined in, helping quickly kill the last mob before they turned to the blue shield dome around the Head Shaman. Alburet focused on it to see what information he could get. Shield Barrier, 35,000/35,000 health. The health of the barrier began to plummet as the group laid into it with everything they had. They had two minutes to eat through the barrier. Bob had to pause in his casting, having run low of mana before they had the shield down. Marysue was able to heal Gerald completely and drank another mana potion to be ready for the fight to come.
It took close to a minute and a half to destroy the barrier. Bob had stopped casting to replenish his mana, and as soon as the barrier fell his Fire Blast was the first to hit the Head Shaman, interrupting the spell it had been casting. Gerald quickly taunted it, but in the second between the Fire Blast and the taunt the Shaman was able to cast a DoT onto Bob.
“Gah, I’ll barely survive this,” Bob yelled, but kept casting his spell.
The other all jumped in on the Shaman to help kill it. Alburet checked the status on it. Head Gnoll Shaman, level 28, 34,875/35,000 health, just before the damage started to roll in on it. It wasn’t even twenty seconds later when the ground around them erupted with a number of small vines that snagged them, holding them in place as thorns cut into them. The Head Shaman ran from them towards the far end of the cave, healing himself as he went.
When the thorns wore off the Shaman was fully healed and had started another spell. As the group rushed across the cavern towards, it a black cloud appeared around them. They got through it but all of them began to vomit as they cleared the cloud. Only Bob and Marysue back by the entrance of the cave were unaffected. Marysue used Cleanse Sickness on Gerald first, stopping his sickness and allowing him to reach the Shaman. She then followed up with Alburet, Karen and Fluff in that order. She didn’t Cleanse Stacia or Tiny. She didn’t want to use her mana on them, thinking she would need it for healing and also unsure what effect her spell would have on them.
Gerald bashed the Shaman with his shield, stunning it for the three seconds and giving Marysue time to cleanse the others. They got there just as the Shaman cast another spell, a green cloud. This one was a poison called Passion’s Embrace that did twenty damage every second with a duration of five minutes. The group laid into the Shaman as they realized that they were now in a damage race against the poison.
Alburet slapped Demonic Vitality on himself to help counteract half the poison before he went back to damaging the Shaman. The Shaman pulled a sickle from behind its back to slash at Gerald, casting a ball of water with its free hand.
It threw the water at Gerald. As soon as the water touched Gerald it started to freeze, slowing him. “Slow debuff for the water attack,” Gerald called out as he continued to fight, the ice cracking but staying in place on him. “Twenty second debuff,” he advised.
Stacia and Tiny got there a moment later, having finally gotten rid of the sickness debuff. With all of them attacking the Shaman its health started to plummet again. A minute or so later the same vines sprang up from the ground, trapping the group in place as the Shaman ran for the far side of the cave. The Shaman had time to cast a couple of heals, bringing its life back up to 20,378/35,000.
It cast another spell as the group got free and charged across the room. Anticipating the black fog, they scattered as they ran across the room. Each of them drank a healing potion on the way to help Marysue out. Only Gerald and Alburet got caught by the black cloud that appeared before them. Marysue quickly dispelled the Caustic Sickness again with her Cleanse Sickness spell. She had to down her last mana potion at that point. Bob had slowed his casting so he could regen some mana while keeping some damage going.
The group piled back onto the Shaman just in time to get hit with another wave of Passion’s Embrace, doubling the DoT to forty damage a second.
“Fuck,” Karen swore as she watched all their life start to tick away faster. “We need more damage.”
They piled the damage on as the Shaman slashed with its sickle and threw water balls at Gerald. A minute later they were feeling worried as Marysue did her best to keep them alive. Bob started to add his damage back in as the Shaman finally dropped to 5,193/35,000 life.
The vines sprang up to hold them in place again as the Shaman ran for it. This time Bob targeted the vines holding Gerald and launched two quick Fire Blasts at them. The vines withered, setting Gerald free. He wasted no time charging after the Shaman, who was still running for the far end of the cave.
“Darkness, it worked!” Bob exclaimed as he then targeted the ones holding Alburet, freeing him as well.
Alburet took off across the cave giving Bob a thumbs-up as he went, “Good thinking, Bob.”