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Session 3/13 – Drama Llamas

14 Mar

I really do intend to go back and fill in the details of last week’s adventures, but I wanted to talk about last night’s session while it’s fresh in my mind. However, to do so I have to give a minor spoiler that I was going to tell at the end — we changed some of our characters around, so mine isn’t a dragonborn warlord anymore, she’s a wilden Shaman named Calypso. My dad’s is a fighter.

Anyway.

We were originally scheduled to start at 5pm, per usual. I woke up the DM at four to get the last minute details about our character sheets and so he’d have time to prepare. I called Shawn’s dad (Elmer) to make sure he was still coming, but he was still in church and didn’t pick up. Then I texted Tom to tell him I’d e-mailed him our character sheets. He texted back that Kevin told him we were starting at 7 and that they were at an Irish festival in the city. So I called my dad, who was asleep (it was 4:45) because he forgot about daylight savings’ time.

Elmer showed up at 5:30, as planned, apologizing for being late and having brought McDonalds because he was starving. Imagine my guilt. So we hung out and talked to the DM. My dad showed up at 6:45. I texted Tommy to make sure they were going to be on time. He said Kevin was being a pain and that they’d arrive in half an hour.

Half an hour later, Kevin is passed out in Tommy’s car, Tom is the only one sober, and his girlfriend is raging at him for being mad at Kevin because “she was drunk too” and obviously that meant he hated her. He didn’t want to come and subject us to their drunk presences but he had our character sheets and it was only the three of us to play, so I told him to come and park them on the couch to watch TV.

He showed up at around 7:45, Kevin and his girlfriend passed out in the back seat of Kevin’s car.

Ten minutes later, Kevin showed up. I poured 8 cups of black coffee (e.g. half a pot) down his throat and we proceeded to play… until 3:30am.

 
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Posted by on March 14, 2011 in out-of-character commentary

 

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Interlude: The Owlbear

09 Mar

The newly-formed party’s encounter with the owlbear wasn’t really a full-blown encounter, but it bears mentioning because there’s a funny story behind it and I’m a little scared there will be another owlbear in our future.

First, the in-character report:

Conan, of course, led the way, while the two new members of the group brought up the rear, Surina, as the closest thing they had to a healer, in the middle. The five individuals—four men and a dragonborn woman more intimidating than any of them—walked through the forest with confident ease, until someone heard a strange sound, like bark being scraped.

No one in the party really knew that much about the natural world, but the human, the invoker, was a wise and insightful individual. He was able to put two and two together to reach four, and he identified the sound—as an owlbear.

Owlbears were famous for their bad temper, and were prone to anything they caught sight of. They were also considered much more powerful than the party was, even collectively. The group backed away slowly and circled wide to avoid the tree they presumed housed the owlbear, heading toward the city that was their destination.

I laughed out loud during the session, because over the course of the last week I had come across an apparently infamous top ten list of worst d&d monsters ever and showed it to our DM, and of course it included the owlbear. Later, I found out that the owlbear was the first monster to kill one of our DM’s characters, and he apparently has a soft spot in his heart for them, no matter how ridiculous they are.

Apparently, the owlbear wasn’t the hardest encounter we could have chosen to face (the mountains were designed to make us turn back after the first encounter, which would have almost-but-not-quite killed us), but we avoided it anyway. Level 8 boss monster wasn’t something we felt up to at level two, particularly given that half the party characters were being played by utter newbies.

I feel certain we’ll see another owlbear later on, god help us.

 
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Posted by on March 9, 2011 in adventure report, out-of-character commentary

 

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Interlude: Meeting Up

07 Mar

It took a little bit to get Kevin’s character made up, and one negative consequence of the DM being in Florida while everyone else was at my Baltimore apartment became apparent, because the way we had the videocam set up, he didn’t realize that Tommy was present until the third or forth time I mentioned it, which was pretty funny when it came time to set up the map and encounter.

We started the day with Ty, Surina and Conan returning from the cavern victorious, carrying their loot. They had the choice of heading toward the big city, or back to the village they’d come from–the village which held the lying drunk who had lured them a deathtrap that used the bodies of adventurers as necromantic tools to raise deadly zombies for a heretic cult of the Raven Queen.[1]

Better opportunities to acquire gold being irresistible to Conan, the party elected to head toward the city. But on their way, they heard a, well, a high-pitched and girlish scream for help.[2] The three decided, somewhat reluctantly, not to ignore it, and headed north, where a human and an elf had apparently been investigating a ruined tower, and had been cornered by a group of goblins. Ty declared an oath of enmity[3] upon the closest and attacked.

Conan, Ty and Surina wound up a few feet to the southeast of the fallen tower in which the elf and human stood, fighting goblins that snuck out from behind stands of trees. The bow-wielding elf fled to the protection of their presence, leaving his fellow adventurer alone in the tower.

The invoker didn’t seem to mind, calling down what seemed to be lightning upon the archer and melee fighter that stood within his line of sight.

One of the goblins became bloodied and fled, but his attempt to escape Ty was foolish and doomed.

Hardly anyone was injured in the battle by the time that all of the goblins had been dispatched. Though avarice glinted in Conan’s eyes as he considered the loot the human and elf carried, he knew Surina would never agree to take it from their cold, dead corpses–and he was glad that the three of them outnumbered the other two when he considered the swiftly-hidden hint of avarice in the human’s eye, in turn.

“I hope you aren’t headed for the caverns,” Surina said dryly. “We’ve already cleared it out.”

The human looked disappointed.

“Besides, it was a trap.”

“The drunk lied to us,” Conan added darkly. “Is he who you got your information from?”

The elf nodded.

“Well, we’re headed to the city,” Surina said.

“I’m a little tempted to head after the drunk,” Conan admitted.

Surina very nearly threw up her hands, as it had been Conan who pushed to go the city in the first place.

The mountains nearby seemed impassable, but they knew they could adventure there, return to the village to see about the drunk, or seek out a job at the city.

The newly-formed group elected to continue on toward the city.

[1] I feel like I should note that the DM put a lot of effort into setting up the slayertown for us with the drunk, and I think he’s a little sad we bypassed it. But like I’ve said before–nothing comes between my father and opportunities for gold, real or imagined.
[2] Courtesy of Kevin.
[3] Shocking the DM, since Shawn had pretty much entirely forgotten about the skill last week.

 
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Posted by on March 7, 2011 in adventure report

 

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Before The Fact

06 Mar

It is Sunday morning and my boyfriend and I are busy cleaning the apartment so that it is fit, once again, for company. In addition, I thought I’d give an out-of-character account of last week’s adventure and let everyone know about some changes to the group that have occurred through the week.

First, I thought I might share something ironic and funny that happened during the last game, since it’s the kind of out-of-character thing that makes games fun but doesn’t really have a place in an in-character write-up.

The Sarcophagi Interlude was apparently intended by our DM to teach us that sometimes you can’t get the loot, no matter how tempting. Of course, words like “can’t” don’t come between my father (Win, Conan’s player) and even imaginary gold, because he’s an inveterate packrat, which is how we wound up pouring goblin blood into the sarcophagus and getting the treasure anyway.

I’d also like to mention that the campaign was supposed to be a throwaway campaign and that I was originally going to DM for the group, but frankly, I’m too inexperienced with dungeons and dragons still to do a good job as a DM, and apparently Tristan doesn’t mind our group though he’s been annoyed at previous groups because they’re such huge min/maxers that he has to make really hard challenges instead of being able to follow the guidelines.

That said, last week was the first time any of us but the DM had ever played 4e, or any kind of dungeons and dragons in ages. Since we were such newbies, it was kind of good that we only had the three of us playing, as this week two more will join us in playing. Tommy, who will be giving us a much-needed ranged capability as an elven Ranger, and Kevin, who will be playing a controller of some kind. Neither has played 4e, though they have some gaming experience.

Shawn’s father will also be joining us later on in the evening, but only to watch.

 
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Posted by on March 6, 2011 in out-of-character commentary

 

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Dungeon Crawl: Pool of Blood

05 Mar

This is the final section of my write-up of my dungeon & dragons group’s first adventure. You can read the previous section here.

The group headed east instead of north and entered a section of the cavern that appeared man-made instead of natural. There was a pool of blood in the center of the room, and a cloaked individual on the other side of it. He was chanting. A ring of sarcophagi surrounded the pool in a wide arc.

Conan went first, approaching the individual and trying to gain his attention, to ask what was going on, but he just kept chanting. Once the area was confirmed as relatively safe, Surina followed, circling south around the pool of blood instead of remaining in Conan’s footsteps. Acting as intimidating as she could, Surina shouted, “Stop!”

That managed to get his attention, but not how Surina expected. He stopped, looked at her, and said, “You idiot!” as the pool began to bubble.

“What’s going on here?” Surina demanded, but he didn’t respond. When she approached to shake his shoulder, he disintegrated into dust.

Surina blinked. “Not how I imagined that would go,” she admitted as Ty began to explore the room. As a follower of the Raven Queen, trained by her priests, he was uniquely equipped to recognize the paraphernalia around the room, and it indicated that it was the lair of a heretic sect of Raven Queen worshipers–of the kind who liked to dabble in necromancy.

Then the undead former adventurers–the ones who had died trying to loot the dungeon, as might still happen to this party–began to emerge from the pool of blood. After Conan failed to strike one, Surina took a step back so as not to hit him and unleashed her dragon’s breath upon the zombies. All four disintegrated into dust as her cold breath touched them.

She was feeling pretty good about herself until another four adventurers emerged from the blood, taking their place.

As the three moved around the room, engaging zombies and trying not to get destroyed by them, Surina and Ty were perceptive enough to note the changing volumes of the chanting. Ty deduced that there was chanting coming from the southeastern corner of the room, from a location hidden by view from a sarcophagus. He broke off from the undead adventurers to investigate, and discovered an acolyte, whom he attacked.

Surina took a lot of damage, fighting around the pool, so Conan circled around to protect her. Thankfully, the zombies tried to protect the acolyte who had, presumably, summoned them, going after the avenger instead of the weakened dragonborn nearest them. It wasn’t enough–now that he wasn’t hidden, Ty dispatched the acolyte with relative ease.

But the zombies kept coming. The chanting faded significantly, but didn’t disappear entirely

There was only one place left for someone to hide, but it was clear across the room. The Raven Queen bore him on wings of light to that location, where he discovered another acolyte–but this one, somehow, seemed stronger than the last.

As Conan dispatched the remaining zombies, Ty’s mighty blow distracted the acolyte sufficiently from summoning more. Surina, near death, hurried near Ty, but was careful to remain out of the acolyte’s range–but close enough to aid Ty should he need it.

Conan joined Ty, and together they killed the acolyte.

Then, of course, they proceeded to clear out the rest of the dungeon and collect all of the gold and loot they could carry.

Next week’s adventure should be fun too!

 
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Posted by on March 5, 2011 in adventure report

 

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Dungeon Crawl: Sarcophagi Interlude

03 Mar

This is part three of my write-up of my dungeon & dragons group’s first adventure. You can read the previous section here.

There were two sarcophagi in the room. The party elected to open the one to the left of the entrance first. Conan insisted that, as the strongest, he should be the one to open it, but Surina was quick to point out that she was every bit as strong as he, goliath barbarian or no. Smirking after he failed to open the lid, she gave it a try. With Ty’s help, she got the lid to move.

They crowded around the sarcophagus, peering inside. There was nothing of immediate use, though the armor and weaponry adorning the skeleton appeared intricate–and valuable. They would be able to sell it later.

They moved to the remaining sarcophagus and heaved it open. Dust exploded from it when the lid came off, paralyzing all three. From behind, they heard movement, but couldn’t turn to confront whatever was approaching. It attacked Surina first, for she not only had the weakest health of the three, she was the only one with any signs of injury.

Conan shook the effects of the dust first and leapt to attack Surina’s undead attacker. Ty and Surina remained paralyzed as the zombie attacked again, but Ty recovered next and joined the fray. Surina, still paralyzed, couldn’t heal, but the zombie was dead by the time she overcame the paralysis.

They investigated the sarcophagus–warily. Beneath a layer of dust, gold and diamonds were visible. Surina, though, was more interested in the dust itself. She audibly bemoaned the lack of an adequate container to contain it for later use as a weapon. Predictably, Conan was unwilling to let the treasure go. Not even paralyzing dust was enough to keep him from valuables.

Talking with Surina inspired him to backtrack the cave. He returned with a goblin corpse, slit its throat, and let the blood pour into the sarcophagus, mixing with the dust and congealing into a form that was no longer as dangerous. While Surina carefully saved some of the blood, in hopes that when it dried the flakes would be as effective against future enemies as the dust had been against her, Conan recovered a set of magical armor that suited him perfectly.

Read about the next stage of this week’s adventure, here.

 
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Posted by on March 3, 2011 in adventure report

 

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Dungeon Crawl: Webs of Fire

01 Mar

This is part two of my write-up of my dungeon & dragons group’s first adventure. You can read the previous section here.

In the next chamber, the group was confronted with a huge spiderweb. No one had a torch, but that didn’t stop Conan from setting it on fire using the flint and tinder from his pack of adventurer’s gear. Surina and Ty took care to stand well back, just in case something horrible happened, like noxious smoke or the fire spreading to the stone itself, but it burned without incident. Surina breathed a quiet sign of relief.

Then, of course, the spider attacked. It came from the north and was about the size of a horse. Enraged by the destruction of its web, it attacked Conan. In short order it was bloodied. It fled further into the cave, and again the avenger took advantage of his bond of pursuit to give chase, as he had promised the huge creature. He managed to find the spider, but had only limited options, for the spider had climbed to the ceiling of the cave and was out of range of melee weapons, even those wielded by the huge goliath. The radiant vengeance the Raven Queen allowed him to call down, transferring the pain of his wounds to those of his foe, was the only effective way he had to continue the fight.

Conan had not even that much, and took the time to focus on healing his minor wounds.

Only Surina bore a ranged weapon, and she used her throwing hammer to strike their foe. It came down to attack, charging at Ty with the full force of its bulk–and ran straight into the wall beside him.

After that, it was relatively simple to dispatch the spider.

They elected to continue down the corridor. Confronted with another fork, the party of adventurers elected to, again, head right.

“All right turns is the best way to get out of a maze,” Conan asserted once he had finished searching the immediate area for the loot they’d been promised by the town drunk.

Surina wasn’t so sure, but she was disinclined to argue. Though they weren’t in a maze and all right turns was a great way to walk in circles, she too was inclined to head right this time, in hopes of avoiding the horde they’d heard through the wall after their first skirmish.

Read about the next step in the adventure here.

 

 
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Posted by on March 1, 2011 in adventure report

 

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Just Your Average Dungeon Crawl

27 Feb

This is the post-game write-up for the February 26 game run by my boss for my boyfriend (Shawn), father (Win) and I, as with our characters — Ty, Conan, and Surina, respectively. My boyfriend played d&d 2e ages ago, my father maybe played ad&d once, and I’ve played eberron on ventrillo for a few sessions. That was the sum total of our experience, which led to some confusion at first (“A d20 and then I add what?”). Our DM was playing via skype and we used openRPG to facilitate the game, though we rolled real dice and had real character sheets, using the map and minis on the computer was a lot more efficient.

In any case, here’s the write-up of the adventure:

Surina stood facing a cave entrance, feeling very much like what she was–a seventeen year old woman about to embark on her very first adventure She wasn’t totally sure how she’d ended up where she was, just a bit behind a barbarian even taller than her dragonborn frame and an elf with a gleaming longsword. The three barely knew one another, but each had heard the rumors of a vast treasure protected by mysterious dangers that had destroyed all of the previous tomb raiders.

They hoped to claim the treasure, and went inside the cavern.

It was illuminated by crystals in the rock and, as the group went deeper into the passage, they saw that it forked.

“Which way?”

The elf, Ty, shrugged. Almost simultaneously, the others indicated their desire to take the right fork. The goliath led the way, as the most likely to survive an unexpected encounter. At that point, the group knew better than to expect anything.

Surina brought up the rear, a throwing hammer in one hand and a warhammer in the other. She felt ready for anything.

Their forward progress revealed two goblins–one, a hulking creature, the other much farther back and wielding a bow. The big goblin charged Conan, and the two small groups fought.

Once the goblin fell, the adventurers turned their wrath upon the archer. After a single successful hit bloodied his nose, he fled. Ty immediately chased, while Conan, who was too far to reach the goblin quickly–being still where his melee opponent had fallen–moved headed away from the archer in hopes of discovering that the tunnel looped around, allowing him to cut off the archer’s means of escape. The goblin was hemmed in from the front and behind. Surina elected to join Ty, but was unable to get passed the goblin’s defenses.

Rather than stand and fight, the archer continued his attempt to flee. Unfortunately, he tried to run past Conan, who took the opportunity to attack, killing him with one mighty blow.

Surina shook her head, amazed at the creature’s mindless cowardice. It would have better off trying to stand and fight. It was suicide to flee an avenger like Ty… particularly by running past a seven foot five goliath with a greataxe as long as her leg.

She flopped to the ground to rest for a moment while Conan searched the corpses for some kind of treasure. Then she whispered a few inspiring words to Conan, trying to help him recover from his wounds. They sat resting for about fifteen minutes all told, recovering and investigating. While they sat, they heard shuffling and grunting through the wall. It sounded to Surina like there were alot of goblins on the other side of the cavern wall.

Surina wasn’t a coward, but she wasn’t a fool, either. She recommended that they avoid going that way if they could. Simple tactics, she protested when the others teased her about the dragonborn reputation for bravery and honor.

Read the rest of the story here!

 

 
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Posted by on February 27, 2011 in adventure report

 

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