Here we are again, at the fringes of Bogstop.

Whilst brutalizing 3 more Screaming Antelopes would be a lot easier, it would also be quite boring. So, I will stick with the idea that I wanted to try my luck at a few of the remaining alternate quarries to make things more exciting for all of us. After giving it a little more thought, I came to the conclusion that I would aim to fight at least one, probably two Lvl3 Dragon Kings in Lantern Years 26 and 27. Our date with Lvl3 Slendy in 28 was set up by the game in the year after at the very start, and I’d like finish the regular hunts with either a Lvl3 DBK or the legendary lope in LY29.

As of this moment we have enough people in the settlement to make it to the finale should we fail in every year. We are, in that regard, solely at the mercy of our settlement events.
Of course, if things should suddenly turn dire, I will adjust my plans accordingly, maximizing my chances of reaching the Finale.

With the plan made and reiterated, we began to set it into motion, starting off by drawing the Settlement Event for this Lantern Year.
It’s a Hunt Reenactment.
Sir Hermes Bonk was easily my favorite survivor from the bunch so he is nominated as the Hunter, whilst… err.., I couldn’t say that I really ‘disliked’ any of the other survivors. So Renna got chosen as the most meh to be the Monster, much like Beastia did in ages past.
As the proud people of Bogstop, we, of course, chose to reenact the hunt of a Frogdog.
A 7.
Renna died as she met the unparalleled Bonk in an otherwise playful mock-battle. Sir Hermes had no chill when it came to challenges like this.
As the spectators leave we quietly harvested a Monster Organ from Renna’s corpse, honoring her sacrifice to Sir Hermes.

With the event for the year dealt with, we moved on to develop. With 5 endeavors we had a chance to oxidize the Lantern Glaive if things played out nicely, or we could have built the lope mask for later, or just hoped to find more iron under the Exhausted Lantern Hoard to hang on to.
Either way, somebody would have to descend into the Watcher’s eerie cavern.
Möff was willing to try her best to contribute to the settlement as the most recently saved survivor and she eagerly accepted the task. A 6 rolled was 6 Broken Lanterns for us. And that just sounded lovely. She went in again but got lost – a 2 would have killed her so she used her reroll and turned it into an 8.

Suddenly faced with both 8 scrap and 2 Cocoon Membranes, there were a few new options for us to consider.
However.., I do have to say, I’ve not been able to oxidize a Lantern Glaive before. And I did really want to do it.
We have been very in tune with the forces of unga-bunga so far, and as much as I tried to not fall to their wanton call.., I just couldn’t turn away.

Scrap Smelting got us 1 iron to work with (that’s the 3rd endeavor). And we also needed to make 3 leather.

The final endeavor was then spent to put it all together and oxidize the Lantern Glaive. Is this the best thing we could have done this year? Maybe not. But in any case, we have managed to get our hands on one of the best vanilla weapons the game had to offer and its a considerable improvement to the normal Lantern Glaive in many ways, one of which that turned out quite important for us: it loses Early Iron.

After some shuffling around, the Cleaver was placed with the Frogdog set and the Glaive with the Dragon Armor, where it could actually get the affinities to activate Barbed.
Killennium Cleaver just keeps on losing at this point.

The Hunters:
Weed (Wrath, Marchioness bits)
Cairne (Oxidized Lantern Glaive, Dragon Armor)
Calystea (Killennium Cleaver, Frogdog Armor)
Velocity (Bullfrog Mace, Bullfrogdog Armor)

This was going to be my first Lvl3 Dragon King (besides the 2 Core/Finale fights in PotStars) and at the time it felt like we were walking to our death.
Then again, this might have been a gross misjudgment *chuckels in post-fight* as we should be able to put up a good fight and Wrath, undoubtedly, should give us an edge. In any case this looked like it was going to be a damage race for either side.
And, well to be honest.., looking at our gear, we really should have a decent advantage in this fight as long as Wrath was able to crit every other round to keep the Unseen Agony damage from piling up too high.

The Huntphase:
As we set up the hunt, the Feline Entity seemingly wanted to intervene, as she went ahead and blocked the hunt board after OD.
At the time I thought she was trying to protect me.., oh how wrong I was.

Something has been going on close by, on the fringes of the Cesspond, as the first thing we found was a Cultivated Crypt. The additional tokens the monster could gain from defiling it would be great food for Wrath… so… what could possibly go wrong? We drew 3 resources as we went about our business, leaving no stone unturned.
In a strangely topical way, we stumbled upon The Beginning (basic HE91) of our settlement next. We only had Saga, so everybody gained a courage from listening to a rousing tale about Bogstop’s founders fighting for their lives. This triggered Bold for both Cairne (+1STR) and Velocity (+1STR) before we continued on, deeply moved.
We seemingly only walked in a circle though, as we returned to what we believed to be Bogstop. Before leaving this Doppel Den we were able to rest up, and nothing at all went wrong… Calystea was the only one who would have been replaced, and after thinking about it for a moment she used her reroll, managing to stay safe after all. So, indeed, nothing had happened here.., nothing at all.
Upon “restarting” the hunt, we found a Thespian Troupe that also wasn’t strange at all. We did not enter the Rickshaw, as we refused to associate with artists, and instead got assailed by a swarm of Cleaner Birds (basic HE89) just a little further down the road. Weed was the straggler for this and gained a cheeky +1LCK at the cost of -1SPD.
A small price to pay all in all with a 1SPD weapon.
The rest of the treck to OD was long and we found ourselves Grim and Frostbitten (basic HE95).. which totally wasn’t a Statue at all at first, really (the reroll of Cairne says it wasn’t). Everybody was equipped with full armor, so we did not lose survival as we huddled together.

At the edge of Overwhelming Darkness Weed got a chance to save yet another survivor from the league of moths, but I did not want to spend a full 10 survival for that, so instead he gave up a courage.
On the other side we were once more greeted by an old crone – the Lore Keeper. Cairne gained +2 understanding and suffered 5 brain damage for listening to her.
Pressing onwards we came across a fountain filled with Clean Water (basic HE23). We drank deeply and all gained even more courage, which meant that Calystea lost an eye as it blinked open strangely, allowing her to See the Truth. Her death tasted sour and she was able to self-encourage henceforth.
Refreshed we continued on, and before we could get too far we heard the clanging of metal on metal. The Finale (basic HE100) was waiting for us. Gaining another courage we passed the broken bodies of dead monsters until we stood before the tall one-eyed blacksmith. Within the blink of an eye the flash of a blade took off one of Velocity’s ears and we were presented with steel gear in exchange for it. I did not consider the shield at all and in the end we left both items at the anvil, although I probably could have ditched the cleaver at this point.
The potentially final event we had to face was an Ornate Temple in the distance. Turning out to be merely a mirage, we instead found Putrid Tunnels (basic HE86). Both Weed and Cairne ventured in far enought to meet the lepers living within, contracting the disease as so many of Bogstop’s greatest heroes have had in the past as well.

Despite losing 2 rerolls to this hunt, we reached the monster in about as good a state as possible.

On Level 3 the Dragon King has the Smolder trait which triggers Irradiate at the beginning of each Monster turn.
It also has a +1LCK-token and Indomitable (not that it needs it for its functionality considering the Dragon King cannot be knocked down).
In our case the monster also starts with Overheat in play, this will trigger Irradiate at the end of every monster turn as well until the first Meltdown happens, as well as both an additional +1SPD and +1DMG token.

Hopefully Wrath could keep the token count low, then we should be fine.

18 (19) cards in the deck. The Dragon King started the fight with Smolder into Molten Strike. It targeted Cairne, a leper, who quickly surged in a block, hitting 3 times (on 4+) for 4 (5) damage each. Cairne blocked one of the hits, he dodged another and after taking 4 damage to his arms, he dashed out of 2 Irradiate activations.
Cairne did also become the priority target for blocking that first hit.

Weed activated first and we saw a Microwave Heart on top, not ideal but maybe we could find something more crit-able with the horripilation dice. Carried by the wings of destiny, he chose to go in anyhow and hit once, plus once more from Horripilation. The King’s Mouth was the second hit location and with it, we had found our crit spot! After almost dropping the dice off the table I rolled that beautiful 7. Which was still enough, even with the LCK-token on the monster, thanks to the cleaner birds earlier. Gleefully Wrath ate up all the tokens, debilitating the monster and dealing massive damage as well.
The second hit also dealt a wound before Weed was lightly Irradiated for it.
He surged and hit the Serpent Wings, dealing another critical wound, instantly removing the new -1TGH-token.
That was 11 wounds in 3 hits, more than half the monsters health pool carved through!
Wrath was clearly made to hunt these monsters, if there was any doubt about it (lore \o/).

Calystea moved around a little and pumped her armor, before Cairne got his go.
He dealt a single wound and the dragon king jumped up, flying away. This gave Velocity a good angle of attack for her charge.

Seeing her opening, she dashed into range and charged!
2 hits activated onslaught as she pummeled the monster into oblivion. The first hit was a critical hit! In addition the hit came in at 44, so it dealt an additional wound as well. The second hit was a 34 which was also more than enough for 2 more wounds thanks to surpass 10. After Unseen Agony got done, Calystea dashed out of the upcoming damage zone before the Dragon King activated.

2 (3) cards remaining. Smolder was triggered setting of Unseen Agony for 2. With most of her 10 armor still intact, Velocity did not really care too much. The Dragon King then drew Tooth and Nail and took off.
Cairne, of course, had priority target and was thus chosen to be attacked. The monster did not reach him though. During the flow of the card, both Weed and Cairne dashed out of the range of Unseen Agony.
Overheat triggered as well to little effect and the survivors were set to go.

Weed activateed first. The trap was on top. Nice! Weed opted to only deflect for the turn and I let Cairne move in to trigger the counter attack. He almost missed both hits, but a 3+ was enough to just about get the trap in the end.
3 hits for 3 damage each were waiting for him, non of which he could avoid, and he was sent to the heavens with a beautiful uppercut!

Calystea pumped her armor again – as she usually did – staying passive on the sidelines. Weed had already dashed, so it was up to Velocity to deal with the monster before Cairne came crashing down again.
Knowing the assignment, she charged in. Hitting twice again, we got to see the deathblow amongst the hit but we wouldn’t be able to make use of it unless the first wound were a crit. And, what can I say, I didn’t trust the bonk for fine detail work like that. So we ignored the deathblow and instead went for the outright kill.
First wound roll was only a 2… which still amounted to 28, which was still enough to activate surpass 10 even at full TGH.
The second hit for 36 killed the monster dead.

What a sobering experience.. for the monster mostly.
As you can tell I did not expect to tear this dragon apart in such a manner. I want to sit here and go on about how fairly unlikely this is to happen again any time soon (or at all), be it this campaign or the next, but I guess I should probably just shut up and and be happy with the strength we have been lucky enough to attain in Bogstop as well as finally adjust some of my expectations in regards to what’s going to happen during the rest of this campaign at least.
This does come down to my inexperience with a lot of the higher level monsters largely, so please be patient with me.
Unga-bunga protects.

After catching Cairne on his way down, we gained our rewards.
Weed (+1STR) and Velocity (+1STR) aged up. Cairne was able to get Axe spec activated at 3 points of weapon proficiency.
Then we gained our resources.

Overall it was a decent draw, especially as we got the Dragon Iron as well. There was also a bunch of scrap to work with for us that should help with our final real goal for the campaign – finishing that Marchioness set.

All things considered the way this played out.., I should just do it again next year.

With yet another year in the books we are very close to the home stretch. I will be back next time with, hopefully the update on monday as we are all waiting on that new revised timeline.
Maybe, just maybe – albeit not likely – we might finally have an idea when the next wave of stuff is supposed to ship out to backers.
I wouldn’t hold my breath in regards to CoD news.

As always, thank you very much for your time, fly me to the moon and let me play amongst the stars,
Amathul