Strikers

Last night's D&D Encounters went well.  Far more combat than previous sessions, definitely.  My PC, an eladrin nethermancer with drow issues, managed to participate in them, too.  The mix of characters did show how brutal a party of strikers can be in D&D 4th.  We had an oversized table due to a lack of DMs.  My table had a drow assassin, a pixie vampire, a dwarf hunter, a half-orc berserker, a dwarf slayer, and my nethermancer.  In game terms, that's three and a half strikers (berserkers are part defenders, part striker, depending on temperament), half a defender, and two controllers.  Our opponents couldn't stay on their feet, thanks to the dwarf hunter, and then were pummeled into a thin paste, thanks to the strikers.  To give you an idea of how dangerous a party like this is, ask the cave fishers (underground oversized crayfish with a taste for adventurers).  They started on the ceiling, attacking from above.  One died from bloodloss caused by axes and swords.  The other, well, pummeled by a pixie, then dropped from the ceiling by the hunter.

The big bad of the night turned out to be a drow wraith.  Undead are usually vulnerable to radiant, yet we had no one who had radiant attacks.  Well, almost no one.  My nethermancer had an at-will that takes on the damage type of the target's vulnerability.  But, I had something I wished to try first.  My eladrin has a neat cantrip, Disrupt Undead, that reduces the target's necrotic resistance, something undead have an abundance of.  So, hit it that.  Hit it with a nethermancy spell, and whiffed, though the effect went off.  Used an action and whiffed with the other spell with necrotic damage, though it's effect also went off.  Argh!  But, I ended the fight.  I used the Unravelling Dart spell with its variable damage type.  Minimal damage, but strikers still do a lot of damage, even when halved due to insubstantialness.  Just a frustrating first round with the two misses.

Next week, back to the dwarven kingdom with the unicorn horn.