“Which explains why you stressed that point to Stewart after your change,” Alburet mused.
“Aye,” Stacia agreed, then fell silent as Tiny called out to them.
“Patrol,” Tiny rumbled. “Pathmaker coming this way.” He had his shield and axe ready even though Gerald moved forward to tank it. Tiny didn’t bat an eye, having become accustomed to being the secondary tank.
Stacia began to sing as her eyes focused on it. It took another step, then stood still. “Daze works,” Alburet called out as he advanced with the others into melee range.
“Glad that works as well as it did for the Langistors,” Gerald said as everyone lined up their critical attacks. He counted to three and everyone attacked, but the Pathmaker didn’t fall over as expected. Instead it roared, deafeningly loud, and everyone was stunned for five seconds.
While they were stunned, the Pathmaker smashed Gerald, sending him staggering back several feet. Tiny was given the same treatment then the creature spun on Alburet. The meaty fist slammed into Alburet, tossing him back a few feet just as the stun wore off. Fluff and Karen attacked again as Gerald taunted it to him. “Right, they have a stun,” he called out.
“Yeah, noticed,” Alburet wheezed and rubbed the place where the massive paw of the thing had smashed into his chest. “Fucker has a lot of strength.”
Another round of melee attacks, and the Pathmaker fell over and Alburet finally got a good look at it. Five foot in height and almost that in width, it was covered in varying shades of white hair and fur, with patches of bare, blue skin around its eyes and mouth. Its face looked like that of the abominable snowman from an old Christmas television special about misfit toys. The hands on the thing were almost dinner plate sized when open, which made an impressively large fist as well.
Kneeling, Alburet touched the mob to accept the loot for the group, “Not bad coin.”
“Decent,” Karen agreed. “Solo these would be a real challenge, considering the damage they can do.
“Luckily, we have Marysue to keep us healthy,” Alburet grinned at Marysue. “Thanks for the heal, it felt like someone had hit me with a five pound sledge.”
“You should turn down the immersion, then,” she replied.
“Can’t, part of the testing I’m doing requires me to have it maxed.”
“No wonder you never want to get hit, then,” Gerald mused. “Anyway, we know we can take the solo guys. Next one, Stacia, see if you can make it an Ally. We need to know if that’ll fail like it did with the spiders.”
“Aye,” Stacia replied.
It didn’t take them long to locate another Pathmaker and test Stacia’s Ally ability on it. They saw the mob first from a distance. The Pathmaker strode along without apparent effort in the knee-deep snow, its thick legs shunting the snow to either side and leaving a mostly cleared path behind it. Stacia sang to it, and it walked over to the group and stood waiting for instructions.
“I be able to make them our Ally,” Stacia said proudly.
“We’ll wait for the effect to end then kill it here instead of risking having multiple opponents,” Gerald told them. “Alburet, go ahead and double up on Stacia.”
“Yes! He has seen the light! Double Succubi is the way and the night,” Bob cried out with both arms upraised, as if he was giving a sermon.
Karen, Marysue, and Alburet laughed outright at his display. Fluff giggled and managed not to blush. “Well done on the timing, Bob,” Alburet told the imp as he used Copy on Stacia. As soon as the double appeared, Alburet was hugged from both sides.
“He be right, double the pleasure, double the fun,” Stacia purred at him.
Bob began to bounce up and down in place, “Yes! Yes! Preach it to him sister!”
Another round of laughter went through the group, except for Gerald, who face palmed. “How long until the effect wears off?”
Stacia looked over at the mob, “Another minute.”
Tiny rumbled, “Two succubi is good, but five is better.”
“You’ve had five?” Bob gasped as he spun to face Tiny, his face a mix of interest and horror. “What’s it like?”
“Can we table that discussion, please?” Gerald grumbled. “Some of us would like to focus on the here and now, instead of juvenile fantasies.”
“Not a fantasy,” Tiny rumbled, “I have multiple wives. We do…”
“Tiny,” Alburet cut in, holding back his laughter. “He didn’t mean it that way. I’m sure you and your wives have indeed done as you say, but that Pathmaker is about to come out from under Stacia’s spell.”
“Yes, master,” Tiny rumbled as he turned to face the mob.
When the Pathmaker came to its senses, it roared and stunned them all for five seconds. It ran at Stacia, managing to get two hard hits in before Tiny and Gerald shook off the stun and taunted it back to them. Stacia was wincing as she staggered back to her feet. “Tha’ hurt,” she panted. Her health had fallen below half from the two hits.
Once the mob was down, Alburet went to Stacia, casting Demonic Vitality on her while hugging her. “Scared me for a moment there,” he said. “Are you okay?”
“I be healin’ now tha’ combat be over, master,” she told him, giving his cheek a kiss.
“There is probably a range on the stun,” Fluff spoke up in her soft tone. “Next time we should have Marysue and Tiny hold back to see if we can gauge the range of the stun.”
“That’s good thinking, Fluff,” Gerald replied. “We’ll try that on the next one after Stacia dazes it. Bob can hit it with a Fire Blast to break the daze and I’ll taunt it so it will use the stun at me instead of going after Bob or Stacia.”
“Okay,” Gerald continued, “we can probably take the caves without too many problems. We can knock out these quests today, minus the one to Purge the Cave.”
“Is it starting to snow harder?” Fluff asked.
“Yeah. The snow picks up the further into the hills we go,” Marysue told her. “It will also get colder.”
“Cool, let’s keep moving and see what a group of them is like,” Karen said and linked arms with Fluff. “Ready, Fluff?”
“Yes,” Fluff replied with a soft smile.
Two minutes later they were testing out the new plan. The Pathmaker’s roar proved to have a range of thirty feet from its body for the stun effect. Once they had it killed, they continued on. The snow came down more thickly as they moved further into the hills. Two more Pathmakers fell to the group before they found their first cave. The entrance was mostly hidden behind a snowbank. They had passed it walking, but Bob had glanced back and seen it.
“It should hold a Snowmaker, an Oracle, and a Warden,” Gerald told them as they prepared to go in. “Assume ranged DPS, healer and tank in the same order. If I recall, the Warden has a taunt ability that reduces all damage not directed at them by 90%. If it taunts you, just focus on it. The Oracle should have a heal over time spell as well as a damage mitigation buff. The Snowmaker has an area of effect cold damage spell and one that roots you in place with ice.”
“Every other mob has had tweaks since beta,” Karen reminded him. “So expect the unknown.”
“She’s right,” Marysue agreed. “Who knows what else they might pop up with? Since Stacia can friend two of them though, we might as well take out the Warden first. When the Ally ability wears off, she can Daze the Oracle while we kill the Snowmaker. Then we finish with the Oracle, which should make it easy.”
“What if there are two groups in there?” Fluff asked.
“She can Ally the two Oracles, Daze the two Snowmakers and we kill the Wardens first. Then switch off to the Snowmakers, then finally the Oracles.” Gerald looked at them when he finished, when no one objected he nodded. “Okay, let’s do this.”