On today's episode of I Actually Read The Class Rules For Playing A Rogue, we return to the basement of the troglodyte-necromancer cultist infestation. After further interrogating the mousy non-lizard cleric, we proceed to the hatching chamber and commit lizard genocide on the eggs there, which gets us a feeling of a sharp glare from the lizard god. We take a chance to check out the last other branch we've never been in, get shot by an arrow trap in an empty mural room, and then head back towards the corridor containing "The Failure" and the summoning circle.
Turns out The Failure is a misshapen velociraptor. The lizard god is actually a dinosaur god. The Failure is sleeping, but despite my extreme reluctance to give up a free sneak attack the ranger is hellbent on trying to use her animal friendship. Shockingly, the ranger manages to pass three separate skill checks and gets the Failure (promptly renamed Starlord) to join the party peacefully.
I successfully open the iron wrought door with stealth and get a look at the summoning room. Near me is Trevor the mayor's bodyguard...next to the mayor, laying in a summoning circle. Traitor. In the back is Myrra, engulfed in a maelstrom of divine magic, doing...something... I try to sneak in and botch the roll (sneaking is an awful idea), catching an arrow from Trevor for my trouble. Combat begins.
The non-slutty bard uses her ice artifact on Myrra and misses, I roll great on Trevor but it isn't enough (AC of like 15, yeesh). Starlord comes barging in and bites a chunk out of Trevor because she's statted as a miniboss. The summoning circle activates and kills the mayor. Oops. I try to get past Trevor but fail, and the magic near Myrra starts forming into a shape. The necromancer launches a fire bolt at Myrra and Starlord flips out, but the ranger again succeeds at animal control. The slutty bard uses hideous laughter on Myrra, but even not sustaining the spell it continues to take form...into the dread Tyrannosaurus Rex, Susan! Trevor disengages me to nearly kill the ranger, and so I take the opportunity to rush up to the prone Myrra and for the first time properly use sneak attack! Which takes her down to 1 HP, which is properly taken out by the ranger stealing my kill with an arrow. Trevor flips the fuck out, and Myrra's mind control over this fucking T-Rex is broken, leaving it to react as any animal would in a noisy underground cavern full of fighting prey animals and tail whips the entire party save me.
HP is getting dicey now, but the non-slutty bard finishes Trevor and the necromancer fire bolts Susan (Starlord again freaks out and is brought back under control). I try to climb up on Susan's back but fail, while the slutty bard does the same and gets in a throat shot. Starlord does great damage but then there's another tail whip, and this one brings me down to 2 HP while the necromancer starts dying and fails the first death save. Everybody is about one tail whip away from getting taken out. I finally get a strong hit in, which I categorize as being certain I'm about to die and having gone full screaming barbarian on Susan's left leg. The slutty bard gets knocked off but makes his attack, which finally kills the T-Rex. Susan unravels into divine magic goo...and so does Starlord. The ranger is heartbroken, I'm still screaming and stabbing Susan's corpse, the necromancer is stabilized, and we're on our way out with the uncorrupted cleric.
At the surface we meet the ex-adventurer we met before, Velma, who has arrived in heavy armor and with her bow moving at an impressive clip for an 80 year old woman. Turns out all the lizard spirit corrupted people on the surface basically exploded when we fucked up the ritual. Since the mayor is dead and we kind of got him killed by lollygagging we decide to skip town and not talk to his wife, though I ransack Zuul's house before we go.
Level 3! Subclass time, and though I really desperately wanted to go arcane trickster for that mage hand it doesn't fit with my character (army background, already typed him as magic skeptical) and would allow me to disgustingly break the game. So instead I go with assassin and get automatic advantage (and thus sneak attack) on anybody who I beat on initiative as well as automatic crits on surprised enemies (and being a half-orc, this gives me another d6). God, it's disgusting. I didn't even intend to do this.
Unfortunately, the DM wants to institute a rotating DM schedule...I'm not really sure how or if that's going to work, and it doesn't help that she's already eyeing me as the most qualified second. Anybody ever successfully do this in their games?