Presto Mcspark: And welcome back to Dungeon Tonight, I'm your regular host, Presto McSpark and with me as always, noted Dwarven Fighter, Slab Bulkhead. Joining us tonight as guest host is head of the Thieves Guild from the city of thieves, so give him a big hand whilst keeping your gold close, it's Silk Darkheart. So then the Company of the Purple Eclipse, we left them after mopping up the first floor of Mandorcai's mansion, supposedly haunted and from where few people had recently come back from. Having been sent there by Gilthan to retrieve said Mordorcai's Journal plus some other books. We joined the action as they opened the door to the first floor and i think it's safe to say somebody was happy when they saw their opponents.

Slab Bulkhead: Absolutely Presto, Delamor is a typical Paladin, they think it's their god given right to kill undead, and of course they're right but I've seen Paladin's get tunnel vision in this kind of scenario, they focus on the biggest baddest undead in the room, charge with a yell to their god and fail to notice the sly character in the darkness with the blowdart, hey, no offence Silk.

Silk Darkheart: None taken, but of course Delamor wasn't the first one into action, that honour fell to Athon.

PM: Yes indeed, and a surprising maneuver, almost tactically unsound you might say.

SB: I don't know what the bl**dy fool was thinking, he charges into battle, and then does his appear in two places thing and ends up with the three biggest nasties, two of which were on fire I might add, between him and the rest of the party, what happened, did Gregg and Athon switch bodies or something?

SD: Definitely tactically unsound, but then I have never really understood Swordmages, are they fighters or are they mages, they just seem confused wannabe's to me.

PM: Belgarath then moves in and starts to dish out the pain.

SB: Certainly coming into his own more as a Sorceror, but still I am concerned by his lack of health, he has tendency to rush in get smacked around and then wonder where his health has gone.

SD: Indeed, he enters the room, attacks some Witherlings and then wonders why they then surround him and start to strike him down.

PM: At this point the Boneshard crosses the room and promptly blocks the door preventing the rest of the party entering effectively leaving the two of them to fend for themselves.

SB: How Athon survived that corner encounter I just don't know, he was damned lucky to get out of that with all of his fingers intact, between the wraith and two burning skeletons and all. I'm also curious to know how Aradon has lasted so long with his reflexes being so slow, I've seen statues react faster than him and they don't move. Well not typically anyway. I acctually thought Athon made a good use of tactics and he's finally starting to learn how to use his abilities as a swordmage and not as a, what was it, wannabe..

SD: I didn't really mean anything by that, I've always had a lot of respect for Swordmages...

PM: The Boneshard is dispatched, thus covering everyone in bone fragments and finally the party moves into the room and the battle really begins, although it's not looking good for Belgarath at this stage. Having backed himself into a corner, it's really Gregg that comes to his rescue. The Wraith then moves for Belgarath, Gregg moves in and starts to attack the burning skeletons with Athon with the others taking down the rest of the Witherlings and the Wraith.

SD: I have to say, I was impressed by the speed the rest were dispatched, for once, this was a well oiled machine that I don't think was ever in any danger.

PM: After the fighting is over, the room is examined, there's some bookshelves, a table and a chest, Delamor moves to the bookshelves and in a surprising move Athon takes to the chest.

SB: Surprising to you maybe but I've seen this coming for a while. We've seen Athon not be happy at the apparent lack of distribution of items before, it has seemed he only got an item when either he disturbed someone else looting (how he got his armour) or he was the only person who could ideally use it, such as his longswords.

SD: He did what he thought he should do and he got a reward, how long has Delamor been crowing over his orb? What he found will undoubtedly benefit him and all the power to him I say.

PM: Do you think Delamor's comment about not being "one of the founders" is still affecting him?

SB: Possibly, don't forget Athon or someone else would be taking his sword out of a beast and Zyanne would already be picking his pockets.

SD: She was a thief, it's what we do..

SB: Yeah, hang on pal, there is such a thing as honour for some people and Athon's one of them, he's principled, maybe too principled for this game I think this could be the start of a change in him.

PM: Trying to move on, the glance that Delamor threw at Athon.

SD: Delamor thinks he saw something but can't be sure, what's he going to do accuse Athon of stealing?

SB: Yeah, I'm potentially seeing problems in the future for those two.

PM: The next floor was more of a challenge but even so they still came through it with relative ease.

SB: Agreed, even with the massive dog, and that was one hell of a beastie, it still didn't pose much of a problem. This is the best I think we've seen the Purple Eclipse working for a long time, playing to their strengths and covering their weaknesses.

SD: I would be tempted to agree, they divided but they still covered each other, eliminating the archers early on was definitely the right move and Aradon's power on the Wraith took it out of the battle for so long that when it came back it had virtually no chance even with the darkness it threw up.

PM: Glad you mentioned, bit of a risk from Greg wasn't it, diving into the darkness and attacking the first thing he came to?

SD: Sometimes you have take risks to get the treasure.

PM: So all enemies dispatche, books found, clock in pieces on the floor and the mysterious key.

SD: Ah the clock, it took them so long to realise what it probably was then the key, if they'd had a rogue with them, they would have put that together in seconds.

SB: Doesn't look much like a key to me...

PM: Meeting with Gilthan, they resolve to head to Candlekeep as at least they know they can get there whilst they try and figure the key out. On that note, I'd like to thank my hosts, Slab Bulkhead and Silk Darkheart and stay with us for our next item, Lich's, are they just misunderstood?