That's fair. And I've made my own mistakes. Since you guys have been reading the log, errors have been pointed out. Lol
For example, on the cliff ledge, it was Ron and Eldeth who were tied together, and it was Ron who asked Eldeth to assist. It was not Brin, even though he took the lead.
When Buppido was frozen by Hold Person, he made his save on the second round, kicked Ron in the junk, and took off running. Brin took chase and rolled a crit on his grapple/tackle check. This allowed you guys to tie him up.
Please point out any other errors I've made. I'm happy for corrections. :)
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As much as I'm loving the 5th ed system, the fact that they didn't have the spells in their respective lists categorized by school nor note which ones qualify as a ritual is annoying.
I started working on that last night putting pencil to paper, and at some point put it all on a Word document.
WotC put this up on their website, what you are asking for: SPELL LISTS
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As much as I'm loving the 5th ed system, the fact that they didn't have the spells in their respective lists categorized by school nor note which ones qualify as a ritual is annoying.
I started working on that last night putting pencil to paper, and at some point put it all on a Word document.WotC put this up on their website, what you are asking for: SPELL LISTS
I appreciate it brother; SmiloDan mentioned it as well up thread and I'm glad they took some initiative to make that happen.
Unfortunately, game will be cancelled this week. Scheduling conflicts.
Session 7.
This week, our Druid was unable to attend. His character ended up in a background role with the NPCs.
The party discussed their entrance into Gracklstugh; they decided that Ron would take the servants entrance while the rest would go through the tunnels to a gated entrance. Meanwhile, on the inside, Ron would pretend to be a servant of a minor house, come up to the same gate from the inside, and pretend that the house master wanted these people in right away. Fortunately, Cicero knew some of the names from his research into the Underdark and they were able to make it sound legitimate.
As an additional contingency, Brin cast Illusionary Script to make a document look like it was from that same house (but without any official seal) to use as proof that they were expected.
They still went with the Slave Driver disguise and approached the gates.
In the city, Ron was able to sneak in relatively undetected. He put all his armor and weapons in a pack to keep them hidden. Once in the city, he scouted around for a bit and made his way to the docks. He discovered that it would cost 60 GP to secure a couple of boats to bring everyone across the lake.
Back outside the city, the other group was just reaching the gates, where they were stopped as expected. Their disguise as slavers seemed to work, but just as the gates were opening, a dour deurgar came out of a hidden door and demanded they pay a 50 gold entrance fee. Cicero stepped in with some quick thinking and shamed the grey dwarf into submission (rolled a Nat 20 on persuasion), and they made their way in to the city.
The city was hot and humid, but well lit. The fires of the forges permeated a orange glow throughout the city. The noise from the forges, the hammers striking steel, the hustle and bustle of the city, the occasional roar of a red dragon waddling through the city keeping the forges lit, merchants barking out deals for their wares, guards yelling at random visitors, and more all brought up the decibels of the background noise.
They decided to make their way to an inn to secure a hiding spot for their "slaves." Only the Ghohlbourne Inn accepted non-Deurgar, and they were able to get a couple of rooms for a decent price.
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Cicero had heard of the Grey Ghosts before; he believes them to be some sort of freedom fighter group who rescues slaves and gets them out of the city. Both he and Ron want to contact them, so Brin created another Illusory Script to send a secret message to them. They posted it on the bulletin board in the Inn, and decided to wait for three days before they left the city.
As they waited, they noticed a few odd things here and there. A random dwarf ran up to Cicero and handed him a book, saying, "Here, it's your problem now!" (This was how Cicero acquired a spellbook for his new Ritual Caster feat). Two deurgar dressed in business attire started a fistfight. Brin immediately started a bet with Jimjar and won. Ron came across a merchant trying to sell his wares as quickly as he could - for he feared for his life. The merchant was crazed, and Ron cast Calm Emotions to see if he could help. It worked, but only temporarily. He took advantage of it, and acquired quite a few goods for a huge discount (Anything in the PHB that was 50 GP or less was being sold at 1/10 the price).
On Day 2, a major turning event occurred. Brin was sitting at the bar getting drunk and trying to ignore the hell-hole of a situation he got himself in. Cicero was sitting outside the Inn people watching. Ron was buying up all he could from the crazy merchant selling whatever he could. And a two-headed giant came bursting through some nearby gates, attacking everyone in sight. The giant was flinging grey dwarves across the street with a single swing of his hand, and one landed in the bar. This got Brin's (drunken) attention, so he filled up his mug and stepped outside to see what was going on. Cicero, seeing Brin with beer, slapped the beer out of his handed and declared, "This is no time to drink, we have to stop that thing!" Brin - offended beyond belief - immediately attacked Cicero, even as the giant rampaged through the streets. Ron came running back as soon as he heard the commotion.
Brin's attack on Cicero was non-lethal, but full of purpose. The punk just ruined a perfectly good beer! And he wasn't about to let that pass, Giants be damned. Brin wrestled Cicero to the ground and got on top of him, smacking the hell out of Cicero. "That beer cost me two copper, and you'd best pay me back!" Cicero coughed up the two copper, and Brin went back into the bar for a refill.
Within a few rounds, Ron had returned and engaged the giant. He tried casting Calm Emotions a few times, but the thing was just too enraged to be effected. With his spells low on count, he pulled out his fiery mace and tried to stop the giant the old fashioned way; through sheer force.
Brin, drunk, also engaged the giant. We made a quick house rule for +2 Str, +2 Cha, -2 Dex, -2 Wis, and at random times I would give him advantage or disadvantage. Fortunately, with so many people fighting the giant, he was able to use his sneak attack. The poor giant quickly had blades sticking out from under his toenails and jammed into his calf. The beast screamed whenever it happened, and shifted focus to the annoying thing causing so much pain. A quick backhand sent the thing flying away.
Cicero also engaged, but stayed back firing his crossbow at the giant. The three of them whittled the giant down, but it's massive hands hurt bad, so they had to be careful. Brin came rushing back after he was hit and grappled (clung) to the giant's leg, stabbing it as much as he could, even biting it as hard as he could. The Giant retaliated by kicking a building, destroying half of it and knocking the human off its leg. Brin succumbed to the pain and the alcohol.
The crossbow bolts also hurt, so the giant focused its attention on Cicero, and a few quick swipes sent that little gnat flying away as well.
But it was hurt. And it was tired. And the rage that fueled it was running low. (Aka, it was low on HP). Ron was the last one standing, and he charged with the primal fury of Helm. Mace in one hand, dagger in the other, he made one final charge and attacked the mad two-headed giant and brought it down (doing exactly enough damage to bring it to 0).
As the two-headed giant fell, another more sane single-headed stone giant showed up. Concern painted his massive face, but he was happy that the other giant was still alive. He was thankful to Ron for stopping it and invited him to speak with the Stonespeaker. When Ron relayed the message to the rest of the group later than night, Cicero had a nerding out over it (GM note: Stonespeaker Hgramm was a named person in the book of notes I made for him the other week).
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On day 3, they met with the stone Giants. The Giants were very grateful and gave them a prophetic warning of things to come. They wanted of great evils and said that they had to either escape the underdark or stop the evil and save the underdark. Hgramm hoped for the latter, but understood the former. He also gave them a giant crystal infused with magical power to help them on their journey (The Stonespeaker Crystal). They requested more assistance - a route to the surface or chartering some ships to get to Neverlight Grove (Ron still wants to get Stool home). The Giants agreed to both.
Now, they had to decide - escape the underdark or continue on to bring their new friends home. They decided to go back to the Inn to discuss it. Upon arrival, they noticed that their secret advertisement to the Grey Ghosts had been answered. They have been contacted by them, and a new lead has presented itself.
The session ended there.
They hit level 4 just before entering the city.
Cool! I'm really enjoying this thread. :-D
Either way, one thing I'm going to do is have the cleric receive a vision from his God to convert the Grey Ghosts into an actual Underground Railroad type organization for slaves to escape to the surface.
Thoughts?
Session 8.
We last left with three paths forward. The Stone Giants offered to procure long boats to travel across the Darklake or to provide them with passage to the surface. As they returned to the inn, they also found a response to their secret note for the Grey Ghosts.
They also found that Sarith and five of the Myconid Sprouts went missing. Ron and Aryndren immediately went looking for them and managed to find one sprout. They captured him and brought it back to the Inn. They also went looking for Sarith. After scouring the streets for nearly an hour, they finally found him. "Sarith!" Ron called out, but he didn't answer. He called again, and Sarith turned around to face him - only it wasn't Sarith. It was another drow. As he turned to face Ron, four other drow and three quoggoths - all dressed similarly and with the same insignia displayed on their clothing - came around the corner. Ron took note of the insignia and quickly walked the other direction.
Meanwhile, Brin and Cicero were deciding what to make of the Stone Giant's offer. They discussed it with their fellow survivors. In the end, all but one of the humans would head up, as well as Ront and Eldeth. The only human to stay behind was a man named Berk; he decided he would stick by Brin's side no matter what. Prince Derendil also wanted to return to the surface, but as no one has ever heard of Nelrendenvane, they don't want to risk that he's not an actual polymorphed elf.
NPCs Remaining: Topsy & Turvy, Shuushar, Jimjar, Prince Derendil, Stool, Glabagool, Berk (homebrewed NPC).
NPCs Dead: Buppido.
NPCs Missing: Sarith
NPCs returned home: Ront, Eldeth
While Aryndren and Ron were still out, Brin and Cicero decide to see the reply from the Grey Ghosts. It instructed them to meet at a warehouse on the edge of the Darklake District at 4 Bells (since there's no sun, I set up a time keeping system based on bells, where each bell is run to state the hour). They scoured the warehouse: it was a tall, single story building packed in tight close to the docks for easy storage and transport. The streets were busy, and thanks to Shuushar, there didn't seem to be any invisible people around (Shuushar has an ability to see invisible creatures within 30' of him). Ron told Cicero about the Drow, and he recognized the emblem as the House of Baenre - a House allied with House Mizzrym (their captors back in Velkynvelve). They talked over a bit about whether it would be worth it to inform House Baenre that Mizzrym screwed up with hopes of damaging that alliance, but weren't sure if they would endanger themselves in doing so. Ultimately they decided it wasn't worth the risk.
At 4 Bells, they all showed up at the warehouse to meet the Grey Ghosts. They left Derendil, Stool, Galabagool, and Jimjar back at the inn. On the way, Aryndren spotted another of their missing sprouts, but didn't have time to grab it. At the warehouse, the streets were eerily quiet. As if everyone had better places to be. Shuushar did not see anyone invisible. They entered the warehouse and saw a single deurgar wearing red robes - in direct contrast to the normal dour grey that the deurgar wear. Shuushar whispers that there are many invisible creatures nearby. Brin locates one by following some tracks, and then nods at it to make it look like he can see them. As soon as he does so, he sees two more footprints appear in the dust, as if whoever-it-was took a sudden step back.
The deurgar in the warehouse spoke up, "Why are you looking for the Grey Ghosts?"
They decided to be honest; "We heard that the grey ghosts steal slaves away and allow them to escape their rightful masters."
The Deurgar laughed, "Ha! No! The ghosts are a bunch of thieves! And that's why I sought you out today. You're looking for them and I'm looking for them. We can make a deal. You have no choice, really; not if you want to live. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to escort you to see the Wyrmsith." Knowing how many of them there were, they opted not to fight. Not like Cicero would have fought it - he was nerding out over meeting actual Agents of the Wyrmsmith - he'd only ever read about them before!
They were escorted into the Deurgar-only area, across Ladugar's Furrow (Aryndren spotted another sprout headed down a ramp into the Furrow) and eventually to the hall of Themberchaud the red dragon. The fat dragon made a bad joke about eating surfaces, laughed to himself, and then demanded to speak to them alone. He threatened the Agents to not leave behind anyone invisible. Once alone, he offered his protection and a portion of his treasure if they would work for him (he did not give them a chance to respond before continuing; he just assumed they would say yes). He suspects that the Agency is withholding information from him and asked that they go to work for the Agency but report to him before reporting to Grotakkar. They agreed and left to talk to the deurgar who brought them in.
They were made official members of the Agents of the Wyrmsmith and given official badges. Brin put his on right next to his guard badge showing him to be a member of the Neverwinter City Guards. They were told of a strange rift in the psychic of the underdark that is causing everyone to go insane. The Grey Ghosts has used some sort of powerful magic to cause it, and they want that magic (or magical artifacts) to be retrieved. They also stole a Red Dragon egg, and they want it back. The party brought up some questions about where the egg came from, and Grotakkar dismissed it quickly by claiming he purchased it. They asked for some help with locating the Grey Ghosts, and he told them of Droki - a Grey Ghost agent recently seen in the Blade Bazaar.
They headed back to the Bazaar to locate Droki, but then Aryndren had a thought - they still need to find Sarith and he believes that wherever the sprouts went, Sarith went. He saw them going down into the Furrows and they decided to head down there themselves.
The sprout was spotted headed west, so they went to the West District first; Brin was quickly able to spot the path the sprout took, despite the heavy traffic of Derro. They followed it to a strange opening in a tiny alleyway and went in to the Whorlstone Tunnels (although they did not know this is what it was called). The tunnels were odd - they had a constant glowing dim light that seemed to come from nowhere, and the sound was strangely dampened. They've felt this before - faerzress.
The foot traffic was heavily diminished and they could easily spot several tracks. Some Sprout tracks and one drow set headed in; a derro's set headed in and out. They decided to follow the sprout/drown tracks. The first major area they came to was horrific in itself. The remains or murdered and tortured body parts were spread everywhere. There was a carpet of sewn flesh across the entire room. At the back end there was some sort of alter dedicated to some unknown God. But wait - those symbols look really familiar. "Buppido." Cicero said. They found a lizard skin parchment with written instructions for worshipping Buppido; that confirmed it. As they checked the other end of the room - the only other exit - they heard something slither and clack. "What was that?" asked Berk. Then the huge camouflaged Carrion Crawler became visible as it moved away from the walls. At first, they tried to sneak past it - carefully moving past only a foot or so away from the beast towards the other exit, but Berk tripped and fell into it. The monster roared and went after its next meal - Berk.
They quickly dispatched the carrion crawler and then scoured the area for valuables. Except Brin - there was no way he would touch any of the desecrated body parts scattered throughout the room.
Afterwards, they continued along the trail of footprints. Not to much longer, they spotted a humanoid figure standing in the middle of the cavern. Upon closer investigation, it was Sarith. Cicero walked up next to him to see if he was ok; Sarith turned to him, fear raging in his eyes, and whispered, "Help me." Beyond Sarith were the missing sprouts dancing to a silent tune in a wide circle with several adult myconids. There were two quoggoths nearby, but they were perfectly still, covered in mushrooms and other fungus. To the side was a single myconid - somewhere between a sprout and an adult. Sarith slowly stepped towards the dance, drawn in against his will. Brin ran up behind him and grabbed him, cuffed his hands behind his back, and forced him to stay away from the myconids.
Cicero and Ron went to talk to the only myconid not engaged in the dance. They learned his name was Rumpadump and that he followed his fellow myconids here after they started acting strange. He claimed they were infested with some strange spore and that it was the Red Lady's fault. They mentioned that they were trying to get Stool home, and he claimed to know Stool. He said that it may be dangerous back home, but there were still myconids trying to fight the infestation. He was one. He offered to go with them, but they were wary. They said they'd have to get Stool to vouch for him first. He was ok with that and promised to remain in Gracklstugh for them. They asked what the quoggoths were, and he said they were dead quoggoths that they brought back as servants. They would not attack unless you threatened the myconids first. Lastly, they asked if the dance would infect them - he seemed to believe it wouldn't unless they wanted to. Not one of them addressed a member of the dancing myconids. They left in the only passage beyond the dancers.
They quickly found themselves having to tread through a thick jungle of fungus. Aryndren instantly recognized the value of the thicket and started harvesting. Everyone else ignored him. Brin managed to find some tiny tracks that looked like itty bitty Derro tracks, but no one could understand why. Then a swarm of centipedes came upon them; Cicero immediately cast thunderwave and blasted them all away.
They moved forward and after a while discovered a strange Mesa. It seemed to trap the sounds of the city within one location. Mutterings and whispers and forges and screams all passing by microseconds after each other in one loud cacophony. Cicero and Brin investigated it for a while and suspected it would be possible to listen to the sounds to gather intel. About this time Aryndren showed back up. He informed than of his opinion that the tracks were a derro's tracks under the effect of Pigmywort - a mushroom that reduces the size of someone who consumes it. The tracks continue into an area that only a small person could fit, and both Aryndren and Cicero decide to eat some and follow the tracks, and Topsy & Turvy follow as they can fit too. Brin and Ron want nothing to do with it and stay at the Mesa, along with Shuushar and Berk.
Following the tiny tracks, they make their way to a door. Cicero knocks on the door and gets no response. So the natural thing that follows from someone who grew up on the streets and broke into houses is to pick the lock. Which he did. They snuck in to find an active laboratory and a deurgar with a strange bottle cocked and ready to throw. "Stop right there!" He yelled to them. "Who are you and what's your purpose here?" (I generally don't like it when scenarios are set up to have certain people automatically attack, so I usually opt for an opportunity for the PCs to talk their way or before a battle begins). They explained how they're looking to join the mighty Grey Ghosts - the freedom fighters of Gracklstugh. The deurgar seemed to like that and lowered his flask. They then explained that they talked to Themberchaud the Red Dragon, and he seems to not like the Agents of the Wyrmsmith; they seem to be trying to control him and he's beginning to not like it. Themberchaud may be a good ally for the Grey Ghosts for overthrowing Gracklstugh. And finally, they want to help the Grey Ghosts get slaves freed.
Back at the Mesa, Brin climbed to the top to try to listen to the voices. On his first attempt, he sought the propose of the red dragon egg and why the agents wanted it. He learned that they use the dragon to fuel the flames of the Gracklstugh forges, but as each dragon gets older, it becomes too much of a risk to keep around. The dragons are an independent lot, after all. Once a dragon gets too old (around the age of s young adult), they kill it off and raise a new dragon from an egg. His second attempt caused massive pain to explode through his head. His third attempt granted him one more answer - and he sought information on how to create a weapon that would easily destroy fungus of all types.
Ron went up next to master the voices of Gracklstugh. His first attempt caused massive pain to shatter his mind (he rolled a 3, but it was high enough to only cause damage). He healed himself. His second attempt was so bad that the he grew slightly insane (he gained his first level of madness) and his mind became open to the horrors of Gracklstugh (he rolled a 2). His third attempt opened his mind to the demon lords and he understood their plan as his mind broke further (he rolled a 1 and gained his second level of madness).
The session ended here.
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One interesting turn is that Ron is seriously considering abandoning his life as a cleric is his devotion to Helm. His spells have never worked when he needed them to (I've literally made every single save against a spell he's cast in battle), Helm has never protected him or anyone else around him (he has rolled low almost every time he's called to helm for help and has failed every single wisdom save he's had to make, despite the +5 to his roll - he just rolls low that often), and he's never seen another worshipper of helm except his parents. The player is thinking of multiclassing to fighter and simply never using his cleric abilities again. Alternatively, he's thinking of making a "Paladin of Freedom," and I'd homebrew an Oath for him. His paladin wouldn't worship a deity, but rather an ideal. And we'd set up some retroactive leveling (every level of his new class, he could subtract one level of cleric and make it something else).
I do believe it would be unfair to downplay the importance I played in negotiating with The Great Wyrmsmith himself. My heroic, yet humble, diplomacy allowed myself and my companions to avoid undue harm and potential immolation. It is my heroic duty to protect those less skilled in the art of negotiation. And while my friends, and The Guard of course, may see my affectations as unnecessary. It is important to note that sometimes those with the most heroic qualities come from the most humble beginnings.
But I do not underestimate my companions. They are fierce friends indeed. And perhaps with my guidance will come to fully realize their role and potential in this quest.
Our quest has brought us to an overwhelming subject of study and consideration. I only hope they too can see the value of knowledge and contemplation.
There seem to be A LOT of NPCs. Bookrat, do you control all of them, or are some of them henchmen controlled by the PCs?
There is a Ron AND a Ront? (At first I thought it was just a typo, but as the narrative continues, it appears to be true.)
Wow!
There seem to be A LOT of NPCs. Bookrat, do you control all of them, or are some of them henchmen controlled by the PCs?
There is a Ron AND a Ront? (At first I thought it was just a typo, but as the narrative continues, it appears to be true.)
Wow!
I control most of them, but because I use the Companion System (aka NPC Cards linked in the second post of this thread), they are also controlled by the players when thematically appropriate. It's fluid.
Some of the NPCs (such as the extra myconid sprouts and the humans escaped from slavery) have a very minor background role. They're just "present" and only speak when spoken to. Other NPCs have a more prominent role and are more active in the campaign.
As for Ron and Ront - Ron, aka Ronald, aka Ronnie is a PC. Ront is the name of the NPC Orc from this module.
OK, cool.
It just seems a lot to keep track of. Does that Companion System help a lot?
Before we switched to 5th Ed, we only had 3 PCs, so the grognard GM gave us each a 1st level warrior henchman to control. It helped balance encounters designed for 4 to 6 PCs, and also let the GM be lethal without making a player bored (since we were effectively controlling 2 characters, the GM could kill one and its player could keep on playing.).
I kind of wish 5E had NPC classes so we could do that in a current campaign. Our RotRL has 5 or 6 PCs, so we're good, but my World Serpent Inn campaign only has 3 or 4 PCs (it's an emergency campaign for when the DM can't make it or we lack critical mass).
I've found the Companion System to be very valuable.
But really, the amount of NPCs doesn't matter that much. The GM already X has to control every NPC in the world, what's a few more with the party. It's the party who is more effected; they have to deal with them, provide supplies and food, etc...
Yeah, it sounds like your 3 or 4 PCs are providing for 20 or 30 folk.
The other thing I'd like help on is designing a magic item that particularly works against mushrooms and fungus. Something akin to a flame thrower combined with a fungicide. Oooo... Maybe it's just potent against Infected fungus - demon infected.
Thoughts?
Could also use some help in designing an Oath of Freedom for Ronald. He's thinking of multiclassing into paladin and wants it to be freedom based. I was thinking of just altering the Oath of Devotion's tenets and spells. Maybe instead of Turn the Unholy he could break enchantments that are used to control others, free them of insanity, etc...
I think an Oath of Liberation would be fun.
Game is cancelled this week due to last minute work schedule changes. Damn jobs getting in the way of gaming.
Session 9.
She’s giving commands to some strange looking men with odd hats on their heads. Then she turns her head with one quick jerk and stares right at you. Your eyes lock and her mind invades your own. Images pour past your eyes in quick succession – thousands upon thousands of images stretching from the deepest pits of the Abyss. And then you understand. Those weren’t plants, they were fungus. Those weren’t men, they were myconids. She is no woman – she is the Demon Lord of the 222nd layer of the Abyss, she is the Red Lady of Rot, she is the Demon Queen of Fungus – and she is staring into your soul and devouring your mind.
And that’s when you realize that you are screaming.
The screaming didn’t stop even after she left your mind – because you now know that she will never truly leave, there’s a part of her spreading its fungal tendrils through your neurons right now as you think.
But there’s an advantage to all this. She knows you, but you know her. You know who she is, you know her strengths and weaknesses, and more importantly – you know her plans. You know she is going to try to wed Juiblex and absorb his powers. And once that is done, she will conquer the world.
And you know what you must do. You must stop the Red Wedding.
Gained:
Madness Level 2: You must do something compulsively for one hour – you must run around screaming about stopping the Red Wedding.
Madness Level 3: You see visions of the world around you that others do not. Permanent.
When Ronnie started screaming about the red wedding, Brin decided he had enough. He was done. He left the tunnels to go back to Gracklstugh to find the ingredients to his anti-fungal weapon. Berk went with him. Jimjar decided to keep an eye on them to make sure they didn’t get in any trouble.
Meanwhile, Cicero and Aryndren were making good progress with the Grey Ghosts’ alchemist and botanists. I decided to have these three members of the Grey Ghosts be a little bit friendlier to the PCs than the rest of the organization. As it turns out, the alchemist has been suspicious of the rest of the org, as they’ve recently started getting more secretive as of late (coincidentally, right about the time that the cultists took over). They gave them a new quest: help find out why the Grey Ghosts have become so secretive even amongst their own and they’ll assist in any way they can (within reason).
About this time, they heard the screams from Ronnie. They rushed back to see what was going on and found Ron running back and forth screaming about the Red Wedding and how they have to stop it. They noticed that Brin, Berk, and Jimjar were missing, so they sent Topsy and Turvy to find out what happened. After some attempts at getting something – anything – out of Ron, he turned and booked it down the passageway. A few moments later, he turned back around and came running right back to them with two Spore Servant Quaggoths in tow.
After the three of them dispatched the quaggoths (and Ron seemed to be temporarily sane – at least enough to defend himself) he went running again and started screaming about the Red Wedding. They followed him as best they could – which became a lot easier when Ron got himself stuck on some giant spider webs. As Cicero and Aryndren found Ron, so did two Giant Spiders and a mutated spider shaped like a humanoid (who they later found out was dubbed “The Spider King”). The battle was intense, nearly killing Ron (healing spells from Cicero brought him back from unconsciousness, twice), but in the end they survived.
Broken, battered, and completely out of spells, they made their way all the way back to the alchemist’s cove – only to discover that the Spider King’s den led right to the back door of the very cove they’re in. They didn’t like that. They spent the night in the Alchemist’s den; unfortunately Cicero had Bad Dreams and was not able to benefit from the Long Rest. He would be starting off the next day only with a single 2nd level spell. Meanwhile, Ronald was pissed at his god and has started refusing to pray to him – he did not get any of his spells for the day.
The next day they decided to rummage through the Spider King’s den to see if they could find anything valuable. I let them roll on the Treasure Hoard 0-4 table and they acquired a decent amount of coin, a few valuable gems, and a couple of potions of healing.
They headed out to find the dragon egg and the obelisk – Cicero insisted that all obelisks were black and evil, so they should go there first. They tried to sneak past the Water Weird, but failed their sneak check and ended up having to battle it. The Water Weird grabbed Ronald and tried to drown him, but they were able to defeat it before he drowned. Making a wrong turn at the pool, they ended up headed towards the Cultists instead of the Obelisk. They found themselves at a cage door into a large room with a spiraling ramp down to where a bunch of bears were caged. Aryndren – our Druid – did not like that one bit and turned in to a bear to show his displeasure. Cicero yelled out to the two Derro he saw down in the room; one ran straight to the bears to unleash them while the other grabbed a pygmywort to shrink and run over to inform his cult leader. Cicero did some quick thinking (high persuasion roll combined with good roleplaying) and managed to convince the Derro to leave the bears alone and come and talk to him at the cage door – once he did, Ron grabbed him and forced him to unlock the door.
They ran in and took some pygymyworts themselves to go after the one that got away. Narrak was prepared for them, and invited them in to talk to him – forcing them to go through the arcane marks on the way – forcing them to risk becoming mad. All three of them failed their Wisdom Save and acquired a level of madness on Demogorgon’s table; Both Aryndren and Ronald acquired Level 1 Madness and both rolled the same thing: “Force others to agree with you through violence” for 10 minutes. Cicero gained a Level 2 Madness and rolled “Someone is trying to stop me, I must kill them first” for 1 hour. Cicero immediately started attacking Narrak.
As soon as he attacked Narrak, the other cultists joined the fight. There were 5 of them in the room, plus the one that ran over from the bear room. That cultist released the Devil Dog (a two headed dog). And there was the dreaded Ettin coming from around the corner. They were in for a tough fight. Cicero turned to the coming cultists and declared himself to be Diiranka – the god of the Derro – and how dare they attack him. With a Nat 20 on his Deception check, this caused (1d6) 5 of the cultists to flee. Through a tough and exciting battle, they managed to kill the last cultist, the dog, and Narrak, but that Ettin was painful. In a series of very frightening rolls, Ron was knocked unconscious (0 HP), followed by both Aryndren and Cicero. We had a TPK. They rolled to see if they stabilized, and both Cicero and Aryndren rolled a Nat 20 – not only do they stabilize, but they also gain 1 HP! They’re conscious! Aryndren strikes the Ettin and brings it down to 8 HP remaining. Cicero gets up and pulls out his +1 dagger and his hand crossbow. He fires the crossbow and hits for 6! Then he uses a bonus action to TWF and throws his +1 dagger and hits, killing the Ettin!
The battle ended with Ron unconscious and Aryndren and Cicero both at 1 HP.
They searched the room and found some strange statues that looked like the stone giants they met earlier that week. One had two heads and the other one looked like it had a head budding from it. They also found some magical items and I let them roll on the Treasure Hoards 5-10 Table, which greatly helped their coin count and gave them some useful magical potions. Aryndren set the bears free, and afterwards they went back to the Alchemist’s for a short rest.
Once rested, they head off again to find the obelisk. They found the Dumping Pit first, and snuck up to the Derro looking over the edge at the zombies. They pushed him over the edge and the zombies killed him. Then they killed the zombies with ranged attacks and cantrips.
Finally they found the Obelisk. Surveying the area, Cicero decided to sneak to the other side so they could attack the sole Derro from two sides. As soon as he was in position, Ron and Aryndren started forward to attack, only to be surprised by a Spectator (a type of Beholder)! Through some very close rolls they managed to avoid its fear and paralyzing rays. In the end, they killed it and the Derro. The obelisk was there’s. As well as a Dragon Egg.
They’ve decided to tell the Agents of the Wyrmsmith about the Obelisk and the Derros’ plans to summon Demogorgon. They’re going to tell the Red Dragon about the Agent’s plans to replace him with the egg. They’re going to tell the Stone Giants about the cultists’ using a magical ritual to cause them to grow additional heads (to be like Demogorgon) and to cause chaos. And they’re going to keep the egg. Ron figures that dragons are like birds and will bond with whoever it sees first when it hatches.
They gained enough XP to hit level 5.
At this point, Ron is abandoning his cleric class and is going to become a godless Paladin devoted to Liberation and Freedom, based on the Oath of Liberation archetype on the DM Guild website. I’ve worked with him to remove his cleric classes as he levels up. Each time he levels, he can lose one cleric level and gain a paladin level in addition to his normal level up benefits. At level 5, he is going from a level 4 Cleric to a 2 Paladin/3 Cleric. Next level (6) he will be 4 Paladin/2 Cleric. Then at 7th level: 6 Paladin/1Cleric. And finally 8 Paladin by level 8, completely removing his cleric levels. He will never use his cleric spells again in this campaign.
Treasure in the first part of Out of the Abyss is abysmally low, so I've been hoping the treasure count recently. During the dungeon crawl in the Whorlstone Tunnels in Gracklstugh, I've given them two treasure hoards. I've also given them some minor magical trinkets.
Treasure so far:
In Session 3, during the escape from Velkynvelve, they acquired some potions.
In Session 4, the found some coins and a few trinkets in a goblin hovel (homebrewed side adventure).
In Session 6, the Druid went on a "spirit journey." He acquire four magical trinkets - one for each player. They were level 3 at the time. They also found a bit of coin. Session 6 also presented two magic weapons - a +1 dagger and a Flaming Mace (+1 fire damage when activated).
At this point, they didn't acquire any new treasure until Gracklstugh. This means the first four levels of gameplay essentially consisted of their starting gear plus a few extra coins. Maybe 100 GP between the 4 of them.
In Gracklstugh, they hit a bargain with a Deurgar going crazy trying to sell everything he could. Despite their few coins, they were able to upgrade equipment, such as buying chain mail armor.
It wasn't until Session 9 did they truly start getting some decent treasure, and all of it I added in to the game to help them out and make the game feel a bit more "adventure-y." I let them roll on the 0-4 Treasure Hoard after they fought the Spider King, and they rolled on the 5-10 Treasure Hoard table after fighting Narrak and the Cultists. This really helped out in the coin accumulation, and gave them a few more potions and a magic item.
Certain magic items my players have decided to flavor. Since they've done this, they've been using those magic items more than other equipment - even when it was less optimal.
Cicero is using "Cobble," a +1 Ornamental Stone Dagger with an emerald inlay on the hilt forged by the Elemental Earth.
Ronald is using the "Lux Viridian," a magical mace that emits a green flame on activation by a cog shaped button on the handle. Clockwork is etched along the handle and it's apparent it was made by gnomes for some arcane purpose.
These descriptions were acquired by rolling on the random tables in the DMG, starting on page 142.
GM Notes: if you want a grittier experience, keep to the treasures presented in the Out of the Abyss campaign book. If you want things a little easier, add in extra treasure for your players. Otherwise they will be under equipped up throughout level 8.
Also, by providing extra flavor for your magical items, your players are likely to use them even if they're suboptimal choices. Because the items become really cool.
We're doing RotRL, and we got a little treasure from levels 1-10, but we drove off a dragon at level 11 and got a ton of treasure (finally).
My dwarf had the same AC (20) from level 2 through 11 (full plate + shield). Around 11th or 12th, I got magical armor and shield, so AC 22.
But the lack of magical equipment isn't that big of a hindrance in 5th Ed. I wouldn't worry about it too much. The little magical trinkets are really fun, especially since you don't have to worry about the "Big Six" in PF.
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Session 10. This session was last week - but I've been caught up in reading some novels and have been procrastinating on posting. There is no game this week (I have plans with the family).
After the group finished up with the Whorlstone Tunnels, they left to find Brin back at the inn. From there, it was a simple matter of figuring out what to do next and how to finish up their time in Gracklstugh. Several of them wanted to be on their way to Neverlight Grove.
Brin had spent the past several days hunting for his new anti-fungal weapon and acquired every component except one: demonic spores (the purer the better). He met up with a local smithy to help design the weapon and assemble the components. With the exception of the final ingredient, it will be ready in five days.
So what do they do for five days?
Day 1: They let up with the Stone Giants to tell then about the ritual and give them the components the Grey Ghost cultists were using to sprout second heads on victims. In addition, they requested to have some spells cast on them - they wanted to get rid of lycanthropy, madness, disease, curses, anything they could. The clan priest was able to cure them of everything except level 3 madness, but they would have to come back the next day.
They also captured Droki, hoping to give him up to the Agency. Meanwhile, Brin and Aryndren have started to see extra drow around, from House Mizzrym. They tell Cicero and Ron, who identify the house as the one who is chasing them. They have not been seen yet.
Day 2: They got cured. This made Topsy and Turvy loyal. It also removed any lycanthropy curses that the PCs may have had when they subdued Topsy and Turvy a few weeks (in-game) ago. Brin was cured of Grackle-lung. Everyone was cured of their madness, except Ron's level 3 madness. And Sarith was cured of Zuggtmoy's demonic spore possession. This has completely cleared him of his insanity and has made him loyal to the group.
More drow are seen. More then yesterday.
Day 3: They spent the entire day arguing about what to do next. What should they do with the egg? What should they tell the dragon? The Wyrmsmith Agents? What should they do with the Grey Ghosts (Ron wants to turn them in to a slave rescue and escape operation).
Cicero and Aryndren want to keep the egg, because a pet dragon would be cool. Ron wants to keep the egg, because giving it back would only lead to its enslavement, and no one (not even evil dragons) deserve to be enslaved. Brin thinks they other three are acting like greedy children and just want to keep the egg because "hey cool! It's a dragon!" Brin thinks they should give it back to the Wyrmsmiths so they can escape with their lives.
They consult the Giants, who tell them that if they tell the red dragon of the plans of the Agency, he will try to ursurp power in the city to control t himself. War will come to the city and it engages in civil war. Brin believes this will lead to the lives of thousands of slaves - as cities like this always have 10-20 times more slaves than registered citizens (aka deurgar). He tries to argue to Ron that if they "free" the red dragon from its enslavement, it will only lead to the death of thousands, if not tens of thousands, of other slaves. Ron insists that he must free all of the slaves, but is uncertain on how to accomplish such a dead.
They consult the Raucous Mesa (aka the Mesa of answers) to ask what will happen if they take the egg or destroy the egg. They learn that the Agency will not only try to find a new one, but they'll also send people to hunt down whoever is responsible and torture them.
They went back and forth arguing about what to do and how to proceed for the entire rest of the session, about 3-4 hours. No conclusion was reached.
During the week. Ron's player discussed with me his feelings about the debate. He feels like Brin's player has a much stronger force of personality and it able to override everyone else, and that he's unable to get his own opinion out. He feels like if they really are going to sacrifice the egg, allow the red dragon to remain enslaved, and abandon the saves of Gracklstugh "just to save their own skin," then he'll just retire Ron and come back with a character thanks more fitting to the group (neutral or evil). I told him that everyone in the party is good aligned. I've also tried to talk to him about the "bigger picture." Yeah - you may have to leave these people to their own devices for now, but that's because you're trying to save the world from enslavement by Zuggtmoy. After the campaign is over, we can either continue a high level adventure of you taking over the underdark to free all the slaves and change the entirety of underdark society - or we can just retire the character and say that's what he is doing while we start a new campaign. There has been no decision or resolution get.
I also talked to Brin's player during the week. He was unaware of Ron's commitment to freedom and anti-slavery, and thought that he just wanted the egg because "it's a dragon!" I told him of my discussion with Ron's player, and he's going to try to change his argument with the new knowledge and try to help me convince him that while his intentions are noble, there's more important tasks to accomplish.
As an aside: I completey expected this part of the campaign to take about 20 minutes, and that this session would be all on the Darklake. I prepared for Darklake adventures. Turns out that not only did it take longer than 20 minutes (took the entire session!), but they're not even done! Game can go in unexpected directions, sometimes. :)
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Session 11
Current Character Level: 5
Cicero had bad dreams for the second night in a row. He is feeling exhausted (level 2 exhaustion).
Sometime in the middle of the night, Sarith woke the PCs up. “She’s here. We must leave now.”
“Who’s here?” asked Brin.
“Ilvara.”
“F$#&,” said Ron, Cicero, and Aryndren all at the same time.
They quickly got up and decided on a plan. Cicero and Aryndren snuck over to the docks in the dim light of the city, the glowing reds and oranges of the furnaces and flames flickering shadows everywhere. Brin left to tell the Agents of the Wyrmsmith that he had the egg and they could come get it – he was unable to get it to them in secrecy. He told them that they had to leave the city right away, and requested the leave of absence from the Agency. Brin also warned them that Thumberchaud would be expecting them to see him, but they could not. “Would you like us to pass on a message for you?” asked one of the agents. “Um. Yes, please tell him that we’re ok, everything is fine here, and we had to leave.” Brin also dropped by the blacksmith to get his weapon. It was unfinished, but the smith sold him a set of tools to finish it up (allowing downtime rules to craft a weapon, it requires 10 days of successful crafting rolls, a failure just means he made no progress, a Nat 20 counts as two days). Meanwhile, Ron wrote a letter to Thumberchaud and paid a random merchant 3 GP to deliver it to the dragon.
Within two hours, everyone was on the two boats and they were rowing into the darkness of the Darklake, the orange glow of the city behind them. Within a few hours, they discovered just how scary the Darklake really is: you can only see so far – as far as your darkvision or light spell or torch allows you to see, but you can hear much further as sounds travel across the calm waters and bounce off the walls. Conversations of boatsmen and distant cities form a whispering cacophony of blended hums, splashes from fish and larger creatures coming up to the surface or coming down into the waters. Random punctuated screams from some creature or another. And you can rarely tell if what you heard was 100 feet away or a mile away.
The boats: specially requested long boats that could hold up to 10 passengers each, requires two people to crew it. During their travel, they linked the two boats together with 200 feet of rope, so they wouldn’t get too far from each other.
The crews:
Boat 1 – Jimjar, Shuushar, Cicero, Aryndren, Sarith, Glabagool, Ron’s donkey
Boat 2 – Topsy, Turvy, Sarith, Prince Derendil, Brin, Ron, Priinka*, Droki*
*Tied up
Because they only had 11 people to work as crew, they were unable to keep a full 24 hours of constant rowing. They set Prince Derendil as their look out and then did two shifts, choosing to tie up to a random outcropping for sleep when the time came.
Their goal: set off to a specific point across the Darklake that was an approximate 3 days away, then find the cave entrance that would lead to Neverlight Grove, which was another 8 days of travel at normal pace.
Food and water supplies: Between Aryndren’s ability to forage in the Underdark and his ability to cast Goodberry, they had enough food each day to feed everyone. Ron could cast Purify Food and Water, so they just collected Darklake waters and purified it magically if Aryndren was unable to find them any water from foraging fungus or collecting from side streams.
Day 1 on the Darklake.
Brin and Ron immediately set to arguing with each other – Ron accusing Brin of allowing people to remain in slavery and only caring about his own people, Brin yelling back that at least he’s saved someone, “How many have you saved, Ron?” Cicero tried to change the subject to something more relevant and pulled out his book to started telling everyone what kind of dangers they would likely face on the Darklake. As he’s listing off dangers they may face, Brin cut him off and told him to shut up, and went back to fighting with Ron.
During the argument, a group of stirges came flying down to get a fresh meal. Brin and Ron were so busy fighting with each other that they didn’t even notice until a stirge attached to each of them. Brin was almost sucked dry before they could finish them all off. Ron was trying to kill as many as he could while also keeping the carcasses so he could harvest them for food. During the battle, one of the stirges missed so horribly that it ended up diving straight into the waters; as it came out, something bigger came up from underneath and ate it. Brin thought it was a troll. Aryndren confirmed it was an Aquatic Troll. Ron and Brin finally found a point of agreement when Brin ripped the stirge off his own back and pitched it to Ron like a baseball, from which Ron used his mace to knock the stirge into the waters. The aquatic troll gobbled it up immediately. Ron turned to Cicero and accused him, “Why the f*+& didn’t you tell us there were f&$@ing aquatic trolls in this gods-forsaken place?!” To which Cicero defended himself, “The troll was literally the next danger on the list when you told me to shut up.”
At that point, they realized that they should stop fighting and start preparing to fight the troll. But the troll didn’t seem to do anything but eat up the dead stirges. So they rowed away as fast as they could. And the troll followed. Aryndren used his last dose of Drow Poison on a stirge still in the boat and tossed it to the troll, which gobbled it up. The poison didn’t seem to do anything.
Shuushar had them go down a side passage, which got really narrow, and they had to make some dexterity checks to prevent the boats from getting stuck, and they managed to get through just fine. Hours later, they found an outcropping to tie up to and they stopped for the night. They haven’t seen the troll since.
Day 2 on the Darklake:
Cicero had bad dreams again. Exhaustion level 3.
“Morning” came with the sound of voices and conversation nearby. They couldn’t tell how far it was, but they decided to have everyone be quiet and pull out their weapons. Within a short bit, a few boats full of Duergar and loaded with barrels came into their darkvision range. The Duergar waved and said hello. They waved back and said hello. They Duergar passed by after several minutes and were soon out of range. They quickly untied and rowed away.
About an hour later, they saw something pop out of the water – just a head – and then it ducked back down again. It was the troll. It was still following them.
Another few hours passed, and the boat rocked with a loud “Thump!” Then again. “It’s the troll!” Someone cried out. Then a harpoon came flying out of the water past Cicero’s head, barely missing him. It wasn’t a troll, it was a Merrow. From the other side, a second harpoon came flying out and stuck into Aryndren, who was immediately pulled out of the boat and in to the water. Brin jumped in to the water and swam to cut Aryndren free. As soon as he was free, he cast waterbreathing on everyone he could see. The Merrow went after Brin and double critted with a bite and claw attack, immediately knocking Brin out, and he started sinking. Ron cut the rope tying the two boats together and jumped in after Brin, expecting his plate mail armor to sink him fast enough to get to Brin. He got to Brin and healed him, then used the rope to pull himself back up to the surface. By the time Ron got back, Cicero, Brin, and Aryndren killed off the two Merrow.
They moved on. As they traveled, they started to notice that the current was getting quicker. Soon, a loud thundering sound could be heard, and they realized that there was a waterfall ahead. They started rowing backwards as fast as they could, but Boat 1 did not make it and they went over the falls. Fortunately, it wasn’t that far of a drop. The boat took a little bit of damage and people got knocked out of the boat, but they were quickly able to get the boat back and everyone back in. Meanwhile, up top, Brin and Ron saw a strange contraption at the side of the cavern – some sort of device meant to move boats up and down the falls safely. They hooked their boat up to the contraption and lowered their boat down. Ron road in the boat while Brin took the stairs.
Once everyone was down the falls and back in the boats, they continued do ride the underground river. Once past the falls and into the more narrow caverns, the current picked back up again. With the fast currents, there were stalagmite and stalactites that they had to dodge. Boat 1 hit some of them and took more damage, but the craft held together. After a harrowing time of fast currents and dodging rocks, they eventually poured out into a larger cavern where the waters calmed.
They found another rock outcropping to tie off to so they could rest for the night.
Day 3 on the Darklake.
Cicero finally had a decent night’s rest. Exhaustion level 2.
They made it to the designated cavern and abandoned their boats to continue the journey by foot. They now have an estimated 8 days to get to Neverlight Grove.
Though the next 7 days, they traversed the caverns, crawling through small holes, climbing up over cliffs, hugging the walls across ledges, and a lot of walking. But nothing particularly interesting except fungus and bugs.
On day 7, they encountered an area full of bones. A cavern serving as a bone yard. For some reason, not a single one of them was worried about whatever left these bones here, but instead expected skeletons to rise up. Well, they were right, and half way across 7 skeletons rose up and attacked.
They realized that they had reached Neverlight Grove when the fungus on the walls started to thicken. The closer they got, the more fungus was on the walls, ceilings, and eventually even the floor as some fungus served as a road.
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Turns out the Paladin of "freedom" believes giving them up to the authorities to be a form of slavery and would not have it. So tying them up and shoving them in the back of his boat was clearly the more sensible option.
... you must forgive me I've had terrible nightmares these past few nights and I have become tense and quick to anger.
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Why do they still have Droki with them? I imagine that to be a fun story.
I believe at first it was because they wanted to keep the egg, but didn't want the Agents of the Wyrmsmith to know they had the egg. So they were going to keep him with them.
Then, later, when they were in a rush, the Paladin of Freedom refused to hand him over to captivity, so they kept him captive themselves. There may be a by of hypocrisy there. I'm going to press the issue next session; find it how they've been transporting him without the boat, and roleplay them a bit more to cause some trouble. :)
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Session 12
Brin was unable to make it this session due to car troubles. As such, we had a minimal session.
We started the session off on the outskirts of Neverlight Grove. Before we got into the game, I did a round robin with each of the players asking them their opinion of keeping Prinka and Droki prisoner. Cicero didn’t really care one way or the other. Aryndren had similar opinions, even going as far as suggesting that they kill them to prevent them from spreading more demonic chaos or trying to resurrect another demon lord. Ron was torn – on one hand, he believes that everyone should be free, but on the other hand he does not want them loose to release another demon. Ron decided to have a little talk with them about the morals of setting a demon lord free just to take control of the city. As he has ample suspicion that there’s a demon lord in Neverlight Grove, he’s decided to show them just how bad that can be in hopes of turning them away from demon summoning.
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As they approached the Grove, they ran in to a few more critters. The fire beetles munching away at the fungus were ignored, but a pair of Nothics were a bit more difficult to bypass.
Entering in to the Grove itself, Stool was ecstatic. He immediately gave them a tour of Neverlight Grove until they met up with the two Sovereigns. He told them the story of how they had two Sovereigns, and they immediately suspected Sovereign Bassida. Much to their surprise, Sovereign Phylo was the one who talked about a new beginning and how the Great Seeder was going to bring a new era of wonder and delight.
Sovereign Bassida continued the tour of the Grove, but was unable to get to some of the circles that even he is restricted from. Bassida warned them of some drow that recently came and went to see the Great Seeder, but he has never seen them since.
During the tour, they also met several of the circle masters. One of them asked them to rid the grove of a couple of pests – a large plant creature that’s exhausting the nutrients from the soil and a large worm feeding on their citizens.
The Sovereign then asked them to investigate it for him and to let him know what’s going on in the Garden of Welcome.
And they accepted.
Session 13.
Cicero could not make it this session due to a busy work schedule and putting in overtime hours on the weekend. So we had a short session.
Brin, Ron, and Aryndren decided to go plant hunting and went after the shambling mound. It was easy to find. The myconids pointed them in the direction of the cavern and they traveled until the life stopped. One moment they were traveling through a forest of giant mushrooms, the next it was empty rock - the shambling mound ate every organic morsel it could find.
The battle was rough - plant tendrils whipped out like Brin's naughty Japanese anime, snaking around necks and limbs, whipping forth and slamming against flesh. Brin was nearly killed. Towards the end of the battle, the mound was about to engulf Brin, when Ron can for forth with a mighty smite on a crit (he actually called the smite before he rolled a crit) and destroyed the mount round beast.
Without taking time to rest, they hunted the alpha grick. Perfectly blended with the rocks, Ron saw it move at the last second and yelled a warning, which allowed Brin to jump out of the way as the worm-like beast slammed down right where he stood. The worm lashed forth slamming it's tail and whipping it's mouth tendrils, biting anything it's tendrils lashed on to. Aryndren summone a bear and then turned in to a bear himself. Its tough hide made it resistant to most damage, but they managed to slowly wear it down until it was finally killed.
They returned the Grick's body to the Circle of Hunters, and then went back for the Shambling Mound's corpse and brought that to the Hunters as well.
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Session 14, part A
After a good night's rest, the party readied themselves for a visit in to the Garden of Welcome. Stool and Sarith did not join them - Stool wanted to visit friends and Sarith was fearful of the spores of Zuggtmoy. They knew she was back there, but they weren't quite certain what they'd find it how they would kill her.
They made their way to the Circle of Sporers and tried to walk up the path to the Garden of Welcome, but two swaying Chull Spore Servents blocked the path. Aryndren got an idea and turned into a giant spider and climbed up the cliff's wall to the terrace above. Cicero talked with the swaying Circle Master and conversed with it about the Garden of Welcome. He adopted a mimickin dance to the Master and convinced it that he was here to praise the Great Seeder; the master let them through to the terrace above.
As they approached the terrace, they could hear the rumbling cacophony grow louder, and the closer they got the more distinct the sounds became - cries, yells, singing, madness, horror, please for help, laughter, and more - all joining together in a seemingly hypnotic pattern. Their first sight was the Circle Mound for the Circle of Masters, but there was no one attending the Circle Mound. Other myconid went about their business in the area, swaying to the as-yet unheard music. The lighting up here was distinctly reduced compared to the Grove's lighting below the terrace - a palisade of Zhurkwood blocked much of the light, and only a few bits of luminescent fungus shed light here. The primary source was an eerie purple glow coming from beyond the terrace. They followed the light to investigate further.
They soon happened upon a disturbing sight - bodies buried in the ground with nothing but their heads and maybe an arm poking out, as if they were buried upright and fashioned into some sort of literal garden. Things took a turn for the worse as one of the heads looked up at them and begged for mercy - begged to be killed. A drow priestess of Lolth, covered in fungal growths on half her face and he one arm clinging to a spider medallion - told them to warn Menzoberenzen that Zuggtmoy is here and she must be stopped.
Cicero pulled a dagger ready to slit her throat, when Brin stopped him. "You can't do that, it's cruel" he said. "Why? She's begging to be killed, you can't leave her alive in this horror!" Cicero retorted. "You misunderstand me," Brin said, "You can't slit her throat; it's cruel, stab her through the top of her head so it kills her instantly and she doesn't suffer."
As soon as they performed the mercy killing, a writhing worm-like horror slithered up to them - it was obviously a myconid at some point, but it's been mutated to look like a giant insect larva, it's arms and legs shrunken to vestigial pointlessness, and a strange hole forming a mouth between two ridges on its larval side. "Welcome to the Garden, are you here for the wedding rehearsal?" It's strange slobbering and crackling voice said, both through its telepathic spores and it's mouth at the same time. "Are you here on the side of the bride or the groom? No matter, you shall join us in the Garden!"
During its speech, Brin snuck around behind it and stabbed it with his short sword, Derendil not far behind him and attacking with his claws. The creature roared, and four of the buried bodies sprouted up as Drow Spore Servants and started attacking; as well as two of the myconid adults nearby. Battle ensued. Aryndren, in spider form, dropped down from above on to the creatures back, right as Brin yelled to everyone "Focus on the larva! Ignore the rest!" They pounded down on the creature and eventually killed it, but not before it released some infestation spores, causing a permanent bit of madness in Cicero and Ronald (again).
To be continued in Part B...
Session 14, part B.
After the battle, Brin immediately harvested the creatures spore organ to install in his magic flamethrower. He then left the field of battle to complete his weapon. As he was leaving, he spotted some drow gear from the drow-plants. They acquired some magical items, including a bag of holding! After that, they left. Well, Brin left. And everyone else followed him, because they didn't want to leave him alone after that last encounter. Brin escaped the entire Grove to find a "safe" place in the caverns outside the settlement. Luckily for him, it was safe, as I rolled "no encounter" for the entire time they were out there.
Brin recruited Ron and Aryndren to help him assemble his weapon. He would have recruited Cicero, but he left to go back to the Grove. He found Sovereign Bassida and told it what he witnessed in the Garden of Welcome and what was going on with the "Great Seeder." After that, the Sovereign decided to take everyone not infected from the Grove and become a nomadic colony again.
At some point during the day, Ron and Aryndren went back to the Garden of Welcome to see where that purple light was coming from. Before they could discover the source, they came upon a wedding rehearsal. Try as they might to ignore it, they experienced a vision of Zuggtmoy preparing for the wedding itself. Their minds slip away from reality just a bit more. They push on and discover the immense mushroom tower that is Yggmorgus....
Later on, when discussing what they saw with the group, Brin believed it was a part of Aroumycos, but Cicero was able to correct that with his notebook. More importantly, Cicero recalled that Yggmorgus was actually only a few stories tall, but now it's nearly 700' tall!
.... As they get closer to the giant glowing mushroom, they start traversing across a 20' high ledge covered in moss and fungus, creating a soft blanket over the rough ground. Strange mounds appear in the fungus along the grounds and walls of the ledge and cavern. When they focus on the mushroom, they can see more of them in legion up the sides of the mushroom. Inside each mound is a writhing form, and next to them one starts to writhe violently. As it does, the screams and moans and singing of all the voices around them start to come into a chord with each other, and the voices and moans and screams get louder and louder until the mound explodes, revealing a drow inside. He looks up at them, locking eyes, before his head explodes into a cloud of spores and his body goes limp in the pool of puss and ooze that was the inside of the mound. Their minds slip a little bit more. At this point, they leave and go back to tell the group what they saw.
Cicero, hearing their tail, heads back by himself to collect some of that ooze in one of those mounds. He's successful, but he's acquired a strange new tick. He believes he is dirty, and only by rubbing mold and fungus on his skin will he be clean.
The next day, they made their saves for the infestation spores and drove off the risk of being mind controlled by Zuggtmoy. Brin also completed his weapons. It has two modes: Spray and Single Fire. On Spray mode, it functions as a 15' cone, doing 1d10+2 fire damage to everything in the cone. On Single Fire mode, it requires an attack roll, deals 1d10+2 fire damage with a range of 40/80. In addition, it has Bane against fungal creatures.
They spend the rest of the session deciding on what to do next. Should they assist Sovereign Bassida leave the Grove? Should they go after Zuggtmoy?* Should they leave the Underdark? Should they help another of their companions go home? The session ended with the decision left unanswered.
*They are starting to realize that they might not be able to take out Zuggtmoy on their own. At this point, they're starting to come up with some secondary plans, such as crashing her wedding. But how to crash it? Maybe they can convince her mortal enemy to crash it - that enemy being the Demon Lord Juiblex, the Lord of Ooze. But how to convince him? Well, they do have Glabagool - a sentient ooze. That may buy them an audience. If only they knew where the demon lord was.
No game last weekend. This weekend, Aryndren had a planned camping trip (and it rained!), and Brin was a no-show. So the rest of us made up some characters and played Curse of Strad. :)
Hopefully, we'll resume OotA next week.
Session 15 - short session this week, mostly due to too much out-of-game banter and discussions because we haven't had everyone present each weekend for over a month.
Our intrepid adventurers needed to make a decision: Face Zuggtmoy or leave Neverlight Grove. They decided to leave. They still have to drop off Shuushar, they recognize that they're a bit out-classed, they want to get back to the surface and see if they can convince people that there's a significant threat down below.
They decided to take the boats across the Darklake, instead of traveling by land. An uneventful week of walking brought them back to their longboats; only to see two deurgar trying to steal them! Brin, anxious to try out his new weapon, set it to spray and let out a blast of fire, causing both deurgar to jump in the water to get away. Aryndren cast create water to put out any residual flames. Brin identified himself as an Agent of the Wyrmsmith and told them they were under arrest. He ordered them to swim to their boat and had them keep their arms up in the air. Brin and Cicero looked through the deurgar's boat to see a ton of valuables and food; Brin immediately decided they were thieves (them trying to steal the boats helped with that decision). Brin took all of their stuff except 5 gold pieces and three days worth of food and water, gave them a lecture on the morals of stealing, and told them to go back to Gracklstugh and turn themselves in to the Agency.
With that bit of business over with, they pushed off for Sloobludop. Another week of uneventful travel as they rowed through the darkness, guided only by Shuushar. As they were traveling down a tunnel, they suddenly ran aground. Shuushar seemed a bit confused, this tunnel should have put them a day out of Sloobludop. But the water just ended and they were on a shore. Brin and Cicero decided to scout ahead, to see if they could find a path to carry the boats across.
About a mile in they heard a sing-song voice, and a few moments later connected it to a human woman. A woman of profound beauty. She beckoned the to come to her, and then again to come to her nearby cottage. The two men followed willingly.
At the cottage were two more beautiful women, and the three ladies beckoned them to come inside, to sit on the emaculate couched, to bathe in the purified waters with air flowing through to provide scented bubbles, to eat their fresh fruits of grapes and strawberries and melons. And they did. They bathed in the warm clean waters. They are the fresh fruit. They enjoyed the pleasures provided.
Meanwhile, back at boats, Ron and Aryndren were getting worried. It's been nearly an hour since they heard anything, and they decided to check on Brin and Cicero. After not-too-long they find a dilapidated cottage with strange sounds coming from the inside. Three sets of prints lead inside - two booted and one clawed. They investigate further and find ruined furniture inside, decayed by age and crawling with insects. There is some sort of large container in the center of the room, full of slimy fluid, bubbling out sulfuric smells. They could hear strange sounds coming from two of the side rooms. Aryndren and Ron went to one each. Aryndren discovered Brin in one, dressed down and with no equipment save for a weapon's belt loosely laying around one ankle, a hideous blue-skinned hag pulling the life out of him. He immediately shifted to bear form and tried to rip her off of his friend, who seemed to be oblivious to what was happening to him - as if he was experiencing something completely different than reality. With strong effort, Aryndren was able to kill her and save his friend.
Ron opened the other door and found two hags inside, both atop Cicero. Both sapping his strength and pulling the life out of him. Ron drew his sword with one hand and the hag's hair with the other, intent of cutting her throat; she bent he head back so far that the back of her head was touching her spine. She smiled and whipped out with her claws at Ron's face while he reeled back in horror. Mustering up courage, he charged forward and impaled her. The sword went right through the hag's belly and stayed that, even as she kept attacking. Ron pulled his mace out and gave a two-handed swing, knocking the hag's head right off her body. The other hag, realizing her sister had been killed, casts a spell and is gone. Cicero was alive, but considerably weaker than when he woke up that day.
They searched the cabin for valuables and found some coin and some art work, and a very valuable book - Cicero recognized it as a Tome of Leadership.
No, these aren't in the book.
I didn't really have anything planned for this session, because I wasn't sure if we'd get everyone and I didn't know what they were going to do. I was assuming they'd continue in Neverlight Grove, and when they didn't I had to run the session on the fly.
I rolled for random encounters. The first encounter was using the table in chapter 2, and I rolled up some deurgar. I decided to have them stealing the boats. Note that for the first 6 days of travel I rolled "no encounter."
Likewise for the Darklake - for the first 8 or so days I rolled "no encounter" and then finally got "run aground" and "green hag." So I combined them in a manner I recently saw in a book - "Unwelcome Quest" by Scott Meyer (3rd book in the series; I recommend reading them in order, great D&D-like comedy adventure books). It's a rather mysoginistic encounter, and I recognize that (in the book it was used to show the mysoginistic nature of the villain who set up the encounter). So for anyone reading this who's uncomfortable by it, I'm sorry. I did it to mess with my players heads. Because they were just an uncomfortable with the encounter as I was having to write it up. Which is kind of my own punishment for it, because I was very uncomfortable having to type that out.
As for them skipping Sloobludop, well, the first four major settlements (Gracklstugh, Sloobludop, Neverlight Grove, and Blingdenstone) can happen in any order or even completely skipped. Likewise, any of the three (four?) side quests in chapter two can happen in any order or be completely skipped. It's entirely up to both the GM and the players. This is not an Adventure Path - it is not meant to be run one chapter after the next in order. There is some semblance of order, but many parts can be moved around, added to, taken away, and rearranged. It's part of what makes it such a fun campaign to GM.
The campaign is written to go from level 1 to level 16. However, there are alternate rules to start at level 2 or 3, and it is not difficult to make it go all the way to 20 if you like.
There is no official PDF sold for this campaign book.
I really was just curious as to why they chose the order. Player logic is endlessly fascinating. I know of (and love) the sandboxy nature of Out of the Abyss.
Oh! Ok.
When they first left Velkynvelve, they had to make a decision about where to go. Stool wanted home, but didn't know how to get there (so no Neverlight Grove). Shuushar wanted home, but could only tell hem how once he was near the Darklake, so they scratched Suubludop off the list. The twins wanted to avoid Blingdenstone, so that was removed. All the was left was Gracklstugh, and Buppido was willing to guide them there. At the point of the decision, Sarith was not with the party.
In Gracklstugh, they learned about Zuggtmoy and that she was in Neverligt Grove. Since they wanted to go there anyways, they chose that as the next destination. Now they want to go to Sloobludop to drop off Shuushar and hopefully find a way home themselves.
Session 16.1
Due to obligations this weekend, we moved our normal saturday game to friday. Brin and Aryndren couldn't make it, so I decided to do a side adventure for Ron and Cicero. At the very least just to move the story forward, since we couldn't play last week.
They decided burn down the hags' house after claiming whatever variables they could. Brin and Aryndren went back to the boats to make sure everyone was ok. Cicero, despite his weakened condition (he's at str 4 right now), and Ron pressed forward to continue searching the tunnel, hoping to find water on the other side so they can just carry the boats and continue on to Sloobludop. Shuushar did say that this was supposed to be a water through way straight to the little fish town, so it makes sense they'd find something.
Instead, they found a dead end. This entire waterway had been sealed off. However, there's a large opening in the ceiling, and it looks like they can climb up. They start discussing plans and figuring logistics for getting the whole party, including the two prisoners and the donkey, up the passage. They decide on asking Shuushar about whether it's worth it, and he figured that it couldn't hurt to try. Taking the water back would require another week and a half to two weeks of travel. At least the ground path should get them somewhere closer.
Then the three of us (my two players and I), plus my wife, spent the next two hours consuming three bottles of wine and a few beers while discussing politics. And then we watched Avengers 2. Needless to say, we didn't actually get to the gaming part of our weekly game, as the above two paragraphs took about 20 minutes of real time. Ah well; still had fun. Hopefully we can all get together next weekend.
So I'm not entirely certain if this campaign is going to continue.
I have three players who have not been able to consistently make it to game.
Player 1 either forgets what day of the week it is or has some emergency come up at the last minute that he's been unable to make it for over a month. He hasn't expressed any desire to quit the game, and based on the type of person he is, I firmly believe that if he didn't want to play, he'd be honest about it. I honesty believe he's just being forgetful combined with crappy last minute things happening to him (last weekend he had to get an emergency pest control problem sorted at his apartment). But with so much stuff going on, he may just bow out. I honestly don't know.
Player 2 has a ton of family events/things/situations/something going on and wants to make it to game, but cannot due to family. He is also reliant on Player 3 driving him to game.
Player 3 is currently mad at Player 2. He seems to believe that Player 2 is not telling the truth about the family issues and is just saying that to avoid him and to avoid the game. I'm not sure how that will turn out. Player 3 is also mad at player 4, so if it's just the two of them coming to game, Player 3 won't come. Player 3 has also hinted that his job may start working him on Saturdays and Sundays, which conflicts with my available times. If this happens, I may just want up losing two players at once (at least until Player 2 gets a car).
For the past month, this has left me with one player, who does not enjoy solo games. So we haven't been able to play game at all.
Session 16.
First, some updates. I believe Player 3 has resolved the problems, at least enough to play the game. Talking it out seemed to help. Everyone seemed to have a really good time tonight, and the laughter of the game really brought up Player 3's spirits, and that also seemed to really help smooth over some of the issues. I think a lot of it was that he was feeling down, and spending time alone wasn't helping. So this session's enjoyment, fun, and laughter really seemed to help.
Sad news, Brin has dropped from the game. I'll be keeping his character around as an NPC until they reach the surface, and then his character will part ways from the group. If he ever wants to rejoin the game, his character won't be far or he can join with a new character.
We last left our underdark explorers at the base of a cliff looking up. Aryndren immediately turned into a giant spider and start webbing people to carry them up. Cicero cast feather fall in case anyone dropped. Ron untied Droki and Prinka and sat them for a little chat about how summoning demons and especially demon lords would lead them to ruin. He explained how he had plans to free the slaves of Gracklstugh once he rid the underdark of the demons already present, and they were now free to join him or leave as they saw fit. But he warned them about summoning demons or taking rash actions. And then Ron untied them and set them free. Prinka chose to continue on with the group. Droki got webbed by Aryndren before he could make a decision. And then they all climbed up.
At the top they found themselves on a wide open plateau. They could see light above, like stars, from occasional glowing fungus. As they walked, the ground started getting sticky. Then Aryndren, still in spider mode, could feel some vibrations on the ground. Then they heard the screams. Waaaaaaaaaaoooooooo!
The screams were a bit away, but getting closer. Once they realized that they were standing on spiderwebs, Ron suggested to light the whole thing on fire.
"Don't do that, bro!" A voice called out from the darkness.
"Show yourself, or I light it all up!" Ron yelled back.
"Alright, bro. Chill. We're cool. We're cool." A short goblin said. "What are you guys all doing way up here?"
"What are we doing up here?! What are you doing?" Ron demanded.
"Why, we're surfing the web, of course! I'm Yuk Yuk, and the tall and silent here is Spiderbait."
After discussing the physics of web surfing, and the two goblins explaining how they grease up their feet and go flying across the webs, Cicero fell in love with the idea. He and Yuk Yuk immediately took off surfing.
Ron, grumbling something about how Cicero is going to get himself killed in a goblin trap, sighed. He turned to Spiderbait and asked him if he knew where Sloobludop was. The goblin pointed at a bunch of lights in the darkness. "Down there, bro."
"Can you get us there?"
"Sure bro. 2 gold a day. Or whatever else you got that's good."
Aryndren, changing back to elf form, stepped forward and produced some hallucinogenic mushrooms, "Will these do?"
"Woah dude. Yeah. Totally. Let's go." He then greased up his feet and jumped on a five foot wide spider strand and took off, leaving his charges to follow.
They tried to follow, and the meager light of Ron's mace showed them a snippet of what they were about to embark upon - strands and strands of spiderwebs, cross crossing, some as thin as a garden spider's web, some over 5 ft thick. The webs went tens or hundreds of feet down, and stretched out beyond their sight. It was like a superhighway of webs.
"Where did this come from?" Aryndren asked.
Spiderbait called back, "It was a lot of people, but Al the Goring Spider, fronted the project."
As they traveled, Ron saw a treasure chest hanging from a web; it looked like it could be in reach. He decided to ignore it. A bit later, a strange green ghost came flying towards him, screaming warnings in his mind, "The demons are coming! Beware, beware! The demons are coming! You! You're one of them!" And then it flew right through Ron. Ron swung his mace, but missed, and the creature flew through Ron again. Realizing this was pointless, Ron asked it, "Look. It's obvious we can't touch each other. Can we talk this out?" The specter then flew away.
"Did anyone else see that, or am I hallucinating again?" Ron inquired; but Aryndren saw it too.
A few hours later, they found a struggling form in a humanoid shaped cocoon of webs. Aryndren cut it down while Ron carefully opened it up.
"Oh thank the gods!" The man called out as soon as his mouth was free. "I thought I was going to die in there!"
Ron asked what happened and they passed around some introductions. Fargus, a halfling explorer, explained how he was on an expedition to find the Lost Tomb of Khaem when his party were beset by gnolls. He managed to get away and found this highway of webs, when he was captured by some giant spiders. Fargas proposed a deal, if they go him out of here, he would lead the way to the Lost Tomb where the fabled Dawnbringer sword was said to be. They agreed.
Some time later, they made it to the end of the webs, where Yuk Yuk and Cicero met up wth the rest of the party. Yuk Yuk said that Cicero was a cool dude, and asked he they could keep chillin' together. Cicero immediately agreed even as Ron bemoaned the idea of a pair of goblins following them around.
From there, it was an calm, if not slightly difficult walk down a slope right into the side gates of Sloobludop. "Finally, a place where we can sell all this stuff," Ron said.
A short time later, Shuushar was home.
While deciding how they were going to get in, a group of Kua-Tou approached, demanding their surrender in the name of the Deep Father. They declared Shuushar a heretic, and told the rest to throw down their weapons. Just as they were about to protest, another group of Kua-Tou showed up, calling the first group heretics in the name of the Sea Mother. As the two groups argued, Shuushar motioned for the party to be silent and the slunk off into the town.
As they went in, a wavering older fishman approached them. "Welcome to Sloobludop, strangers! I am Plooploopleen, the arch priest of the Sea Mother" He greeted. "Your presence is a sign the blessed Sea Mother has answered our prayers!" The priest went on to explain how their little town is split in two, with half the population properly worshiping the Sea Mother and the other half of the population wrongly worshiping the Deep Father. He proposed their help, asking them if they would assist him in a plan.
Cicero agreed to help, but said they they would have to meet with the priest of the Deep Father first. And then made Plooploopleen agree that if the Deep Father faction was willing to work things out, he had to as well. Plooploopleen said the heretics would never work things out, and it's best to be rid of them.
They went to meet the Deep Father group, and found their alter - a hideous thing of two squids tied together on top of a Manta Ray, where sacrificed blood poured down into a collection tray. They were immediately concerned with the "two heads" of the squids on top. Asking around, they found the Priestess of the Deep Father, named Bloppblippodd, was in a small shack next to the alter. They found her inside, praying, with a bound deurgar in the back corner. She was chanting the name of the Deep Father, Leemoogoogoon. Cicero and Ron were both immediately concerned, "That sounds an awful lot like Demogorgon."
As they spoke, the priestess got up and said, "it's time for the sacrifice!" She stabbed the Duergar in the ankle with her knife and started dragging him out. "Hold on there!" Ron said. "You're not sacrificing him just yet. We need to talk."
At that moment, 12 other Deep Father worshiping Kua-Tou entered the shack all chanting "Leemoogoogoon!"
Cicero opined, "You know what the issue is with no eyelids?"
Ron and Aryndren immediately understood and closed their eyes.
"Hypnotic Pattern!" Cicero yelled out, and cast the spell to daze all of the fish people at once. Unfortunately for him (and these rolls were made in the open for all to see), only two of the 13 Kua-Tao failed their saving throw of DC 14 with no modifier to the roll. But, one of those two was the priestess. Ron caught on immediately, "She is in a vision by the Deep Father! You all see it! He says no more sacrifices and everyone outside!" The Kua-Tou believed him and they all shuffled out (except the two in a trance).
Leaning down to the injured Deurgar, Ron asked him if he could be quiet so they could get him out. The dwarf nodded enthusiastically and Aryndren picked cut his bonds to get him out.
Then, outside the shack, they heard a loud booming voice, "Blood sacrifice for the Deep Father!" Followed by chanting of "Leemoogoogoon!"
Ron grabbed Bloppblippodd and took her outside. He then yelled out to the crowd, "The Priestess has had a vision! No more sacrifices! It's written in the stars!"
"Stars?" Asked Cicero, "Don't you mean deep waters?"
"Heretics!" The man up on the alter cried, "Heretics! Blood sacrifice for the Deep Father!"
Just then, they noticed who was to be sacrificed. Droki was on the alter, pinned down by many hands of Kua-Tou, with a knife to his throat.
At the same moment (they rolled the same initiative), Ron put a knife to Bloppblippodd's throat and yelled out, hoping they'd believe his bluff, "stop or I kill her!" while Cicero clapped his hands together from a wide arch and cast Thunderwave. The spell knocked everyone off the alter, and Aryndren, turning into a bear, ran over to Droki and stood above him to protect him.
Then, the worshippers of the Sea Mother came charging in, attacking the Deep Father worshippers in a mass melee. The party to this opportunity to try to get out. Aryndren picked up Droki with his jaws and batted away anyone who stopped him from leaving. Ron used the priestess as a protective shield, and Cicero said "Hail the Deep Father!" to any Kua-Toa that challenged them - if they agreed, he attacked them, if they frothed back, he just tried to push them away.
As the waters began to fill with blood, they heard a deep rumble coming from the depth. Soon, a gigantic 30-40 ft tall two headed demon rose from the depths. Demogorgon had arrived, using his giant tentacles to grab swaths of Ku-Tou and forced them into its jaws.
They fled. Aryndren set Droki down and Droki ran with Ron and the rest to find the rest of their group - and they did, surrounded by threatening Kua-Tou. Ron lead the charge, and told everyone to fight back. They had to leave. Now.
Meanwhile, Aryndren and Cicero went another direction to find Shuushar. He was by the opposite gate, trying to get as many innocent people out as he could. Aryndren and Cicero immediately began to help him.
Back by the other gate, Ron and the NPCs had eliminated their captors, and were fleeing towards the gates. Once they had the gate secure, Ron ordered them all to help whoever they could get out.
By this time, Demogorgon had made it to the town itself and was destroying the buildings. "See what you were trying to summon?" Ron yelled at Droki, "That is not the path to freedom!"
Cicero saw a little girl holding a stuffed fish standing in the middle of a street, with Demogorgon's giant tentacle arms slamming down towards her. Cicero ran as hard as he could and grabbed the girl, diving out of the way right as the arm slammed down.
Once all the innocent bystanders were out - or at least as much as they could, Shuushar told them to get back to their people, and he would take care of the survivors.
Cicero mounted the bear-Aryndren and they galloped across the town as fast as they could. One of Demogorgon's arms came swinging towards them, knocking Cicero off the bear and clear across town, nearly killing him. The bear quickly caught up, and they all fled as fast as they could.
Sarith had them go down a side tunnel, and then another and another, hoping the twists and turns and smaller passageways would prevent the demonlord from following. After several hours, they finally stopped to rest, hoping they were far enough to be safe.
As they rested, they discussed their options. They could go back to Sloobludop to check on any survivors - but dismissed that with fears of the demonlord and hopes that Shuushar would be able to take care of it. They could go to Blingdenstone. Now that Topsy and Turvy were no longer cursed with Rattusthropy (lycanthropy of Rats), they were fine with returning to their home city. And, they knew of a way to the surface from Blingdenstone itself. They could return to Gracklstugh and meet up with the Stone Giants. The Giants knew a way out. But the Agents of the Wyrmsmith may or may not be happy with them. Or they could find the legendary Dawnbringer that Fargas said was in the Lost Tomb of Khaem.
They decided to find the sword, believing it to be a powerful artifact that could help them fight the demons, and then go to Blingdenstone to get to the surface.
Session 17.
They awoke in a relatively secure location. At least, with all those twists and turns, they felt safe from Demogorgon. Recalling the day before, they felt like Leemeegoogoon was what it would sound like if you said Demogorgon underwater with fish lips. As they pondered and discussed over breakfast, they started to hear an echoing sound of battle. Not monsters, but steel on steel.
Cicero went to investigate with Ron, Aryndren, and the rest in tow. The sound was coming through a small tunnel in the wall, leading to a hole looking down upon an open cavern.
“Orcs.” Cicero said.
“Orcs? That means we’re near the surface!” replied Ron.
About 15 or so orcs were fighting a caravan of deep gnomes, and it was easy to tell who the aggressors were. Cicero climbed out of the hole and slide down the rocky slope to charge into battle. Ron and Aryndren joined in, and between them and svirfneblin, they were able to defeat the orcs. The last two surrendered and Ron took them prisoner.
After questioning the orcs, they discovered that they were a raiding party that came into the Underdark and got lost. They’ve been down here for over a month, attacking whoever they met to keep up their supplies. Ron offered the orcs a deal – if they served him faithfully, he would equip them and get them back to the surface. They readily agreed.
Meanwhile, with the caravan, the deep gnomes were very grateful for the assistance, and asked if they would like to continue to journey with them on their way to Blingdenstone. The party agreed.
A few days later, they came to a point where Blingdenstone was on the path to the right, and the Lost Tomb of Khaem was on a path to the left. Ron told Jimjar, Topsy, and Turvy to head home and they’d see them after they found the Tomb. The twins were torn between sadness of leaving their friends and excitement to finally go back home (remember, the twins were cured of their lycanthropy back in Session 10). They parted ways with tears.
As Fargas led them on, they came to a maze of tunnels heavy with clicking sounds, clacking sounds, and yip yip yipping sounds. They were confused, but pressed forward. Soon they saw two hook horrors run past them from a small tunnel on the right leading to a small tunnel on the left. The creatures paid no attention to the PCs. They figured that’s where the clicks and clacks were coming from, but were still confused by the yips. They continued forward and after some time found themselves right back at the place they started when they first saw the hook horrors. They could still hear the yips, but the clacks were no longer echoing through the tunnels. Wandering around the maze they came across a group of gnolls – aggressive and armed. This explained the yips. They positioned themselves in a narrow tunnel and Ron took point to protect his companions. Aryndren summoned some bears to help fight while Cicero cast spells from the back.
Just as they felt they were going to defeat this small band of gnolls, reinforcements came from a side tunnel and then again from behind. They were caught in a pincer move. Despite the superior numbers, the gnolls were unable to overcome their adversaries and those that lived fled as fast as they could. The party, wanting to get out of this maze as soon as they could, left the bodies where they laid and moved on.
Within a few turns, they were back on the main road. Within a few hours, they heard a strange feminine voice calling to them. Fargas was very excited, “That’s it! That’s the dawnbringer! That’s the way to the Tomb!” Trusting in their guide, they followed the path the voice laid out for them and soon found the hidden entrance to the Tomb itself. They made their way in the painted entrance hall, with pictures and carvings and statues elegantly decorated and depicting Brysis of Khaem. Fargas told them, “You keep going and watch out for traps, I’m going to start documenting everything up here.”
They descended into the depths of the Tomb, going down stair well after stairwell, each landing telling a different story of the life of Brysis. They eventually made it to a shrine that was absolutely destroyed. The murals on the walls were defaced, the shrines itself in pieces. Something hated what they saw here. The destruction looked relatively fresh, but the dust on the ground was undisturbed.
The explored a room off to the side which housed a single sarcophagus. “This must be Brysis herself. Let’s see what the other rooms hold before we do anything.”
In a third room, they found four sarcophagi. And nothing else. “This is it.” Cicero said, “Dawnbringer must be in one of these sarcophagi.” They tried opening on, and as soon as they did, four specters rose from the stones and attacked.
After surviving the specters, Ron walked out, believing it to be disrespectful to rob from the graves. Cicero questioned the difference between taking the jewelry and the gems vs taking Dawnbringer. Ron just said it felt different and he wasn’t quite able to elaborate on it. But he also said that if they wanted the treasures, he wouldn’t stop them. He just wouldn’t take any himself.
After they emptied the four sarcophagi of their treasures, they went back to the room with the single sarcophagus to find Dawnbringer. They searched and search and search the room, but could find nothing – no secret doors, no secret levers or buttons or anything. Finally they decided to open the sarcophagus itself, and as they did, a booming voice yelled out, “YOU HAVE DISTURBED THE TOMB OF BRYSIS OF KHAEM! ACCURSED ARE YOU, MOST MISERABLE CREATURES!” Cicero and Aryndren both succumbed to the curse (disadvantage on saving throws and attack rolls).
Unfortunately, there was no sword in the sarcophagus. Not even any valuable treasure. Ron walked away to search the shrine, while Cicero kept searching the room with the single sarcophagus. Aryndren went up the stairs to search as much as he could. The three of them find nothing, they switched it up. Ron searched the stairs, Cicero searched the room with the shrine, and Aryndren searched the room with the single sarcophagus.
Frustrated that they couldn’t find anything at all, they went to find Fargas to ask him. He asked them what rooms they’ve searched and after they answered, he said, “Have you tried looking in the room with four sarcophagi?” And that’s when they realized that they’ve been searching everything multiple times except that room.
They walked into the room and within a few moments found one of the sarcophagi was on wheels and could be moved to the side, revealing a hidden room underneath. Ron immediately jumped down, ready to face any threat. A wraith howled with glee and charged, declaring that once it sucked their life it would grow in power and escape this wretched cage and once again rule mankind. Aryndren and Cicero jumped down into the room to help fight it. Aryndren turned into a bear and became the greatest threat in the room, and the wraith focused its attacks on him. Meanwhile, that feminine voice called out again, saying, “I’m in here, I can help!” Ron ran over to the sarcophagus – the real sarcophagus of Brysis – and tried to push the lid off, but was unable to. Round after round after round, Ron tried to lift, shove, push, move, anything, but he could not gather the strength (poor guy never rolled over an 11 and the DC was set to 17). Finally, he pushed it off and grabbed the glowing sword.
Aryndren was hurt badly from the wraith, each of its attacks drained the life out of him, making him weaker and weaker. To make matters worse, both he and Cicero were cursed, and found it very difficult to resist the drain and to successfully hit. Ron came charging in with the sword, and missed. And missed again. It was Aryndren who finally dispatched the evil spirit. Ron may not have helped in the battle, but he was excited to hold the Dawnbringer.
Cicero and Aryndren searched the room and found an invisible treasure chest.
Once the excitement was over, they could physically feel the difference in the Tomb. It no longer felt dangerous or off. It felt safe. They decided to stay the night in the tomb, not only to get a chance to rest up in a relatively secure location, but also for Ron to attune to Dawnbringer and for Fargas to continue documenting the tomb itself.
Dawnbringer told Ron that it’s been trapped in this tomb, in the darkness, surrounded by evil for centuries, perhaps even millennia. Fargas mentioned that the record say the sky cities fell somewhere between 5000 and 1500 years ago, so she’s been down here for as long as that, alone with a creature of darkness and evil. Between Dawnbringer and Fargas, they told the story of Netheril and the Netherese people and of who Brysis was during that time. Dawnbringer also told many of her own stories…
Story 1: In an ancient revival of the war between Giants and dragons, an outpost of humans found themselves alone, besieged by goblins, orcs, and the legions of a lich all vying for the strategic location. Cut off from support, a lone paladin serving Pelor guarded the broken gates day and night while the widows and children of the deceased rained fiery debris onto those climbing the walls.
Before the sun rose on the third day, he was finally cut down. His squire ran to him, shouting as orcs, goblins, and undead stormed into the town. He took the sword of his fallen mentor and charged into the enemy forces with the rising dawn. Screams erupted from the enemy ranks as the enemy forces faced the blinding might of Pelor himself, acting through the squire. The day was hard-fought, but the child reigned victorious by the end.
When reinforcements finally arrived, they found huddled masses and one young knight in oversized armor, a burning hate lingering in his eyes. This young man took command of the forces and stormed the Lich's nearby stronghold, crushing the undead beneath his fiery sword. In awe of his prowess, the older Knights in the army delivered the young man to the elders. Many years passed, and the grown squire took command of the forces of Pelor in those dark times, becoming the founder of the modern Order of Pelor.
Story 2: A list of the owners of Dawnbringer:
Brandiboo Barnslinger: A gnomish rogue and assassin of the lowest order. He stole Dawnbringer from its former master. Dawnbringer refused to aid the assassin, but the assassin still believed he could tame the sword and brought it with him wherever he went. Dawnbringer never let him know that she was sentient. In a daring assassination plot on a gnomish noble, Dawnbringer let loose a mighty wail and began flashing the lights of the house, leading guards to Brandiboo. Brandiboo was caught and captured.
Sir Johorgan Jewelsmith: Owned Dawnbringer but never used her. Held her in his office for two weeks before gifting it to Glimmerall. She never spoke to him once.
Glimmerall Gloomfuddle: A gnomish paladin with a knack for humor. He was one of the early people to breach into the realm of the Divine Prankster, an elite group of cleric/bards who combined humor and piety. In particular, Glimmerall was known for pioneering the ability to enrage enemies through crass jokes, thus ensuring that they would attack him rather than his allies. He wore heavy armor.
Glimmerall was gifted Dawnbringer by Sir Johorgan Jewelsmith, a wealthy patron who appreciated his comedy to a high degree. Glimmerall seemed destined to wield the blade and did so for many years. They became fast friends. He would use her light as his symbol, often weaving light into his stories.
One famous story was of how he used it to banish the Bloodthorn Blightlord. The Blightlord began crossbreeding the Bloodthorn vine with various animals and even humanoids turning them into bloodsucking creatures with vines and poisonous berries growing from them.
The Blightlord set up in the middle of a swampy region of the forest near where Glimmerall called home. Glimmerall led the expedition into the Blightlord’s underground laboratory, which held tunnels stretching for miles. Dawnbringer’s light caused physical pain to the Bloodthorns, as if they were partially undead. Indeed, the Bloodthorn creatures were remarkably similar to vampiric creatures.
In the end, Glimmerall, Dawnbringer, and their companions vanquished the Bloodthorn Blightlord from the forest.
Axebeak Gloomfuddle: A relative of Glimmeralls. In Glimmerall’s old age, a great peril called from the underdark. Glimmerall bestowed the sword upon Axebeak, who then took it to the underdark, never to be seen again.
Dawnbringer actually had a sibling, so to speak. When the sword was being forged, they had a few failed experiments, but didn’t think that anything sentient actually survived. The deranged creature travelled a bit of the world aimlessly before beginning to get curious about specific things.
Dawnbringer met the creature once. It was in a time when she had been lost in a cave. The creature was its “owner” during that time. He hid with her in a cave. He talked to her, toyed with her, and threatened her. They were two immortals, one good and one cruel.
The creature eventually left the cave. When he first went to attack someone, Dawnbringer let loose a flurry of light, continuously stunning the creature until it lost its form. The creature was so disgusted by Dawnbringer’s actions that he left and Dawnbringer never saw him again.
The Penumbra Fiend lives only in glass, crystal, or other translucent gems, but can manipulate light, even to the point of creating a body for itself out of light and shadow. The body is like that of a serpentine beast of darkness with a huge maw through which it devours almost anything, but it prefers to eat the soft, easily shredded matter called flesh. The creature must absorb solid matter, or it loses the ability to take solid form.
“Of course,” Fargas said, “These can’t all be true. She’s been trapped down here for thousands of years; it’s likely she’s made many of them up to keep herself sane.”
Session 18
For this session, Aryndren was unable to attend. He had a bachelor party to go to.
The next day they left the Tomb and made their way to Blingdenstone. On the way, they passed by the dead gnolls, all bloated and covered in insects. This time, they took the time to search the bodies and grabbed their valuables and weapons – but decidedly left the armor. They also decided that since they had the time, might as well see what was going on around here. They searched the rest of the maze and eventually found the hook horror bodies. An examination told them that the hook horrors died from the gnoll attack, and they were protecting their nest. In a small nook below the cavern, they found the nest itself. Four hook horror eggs that looked like they were ready to hatch at any moment. Yuk Yuk, Spiderbait, Prince Derendil, and the two orcs all looked upon the eggs with hunger, but Ron couldn’t stand the idea of eating an egg that was about to hatch. Ron took two and Cicero took two.
Within the hour, the first two eggs hatched. One of Ron’s and one of Ciceros. One hook horror infant imprinted on each of them, and they now had two tiny critters following them around demanding to be fed. Over the next 6 hours, neither of the other two eggs hatched, so they gave them away to the others for lunch.
That evening they made it to the first set of doors leading to Blingdenstone. A huge set of double doors made of marble blocked the entire cave. Cicero declared he was casting the bardic knock spell, and he walked up to the doors and knocked on them. A small wooden panel up above opened up, and they could see a small gnomish face behind the crossbow that pointed out. “Who’re you?” it asked.
“I’m Cicero, this is Ron, and we’re friends with Jimjar, Topsy, and Turvy. We brought them home.”
“You were the ones responsible for releasing that accursed Jimjar upon us?!” he demanded. Just then, the doors started opening and behind them were 30 deep gnomes with crossbows pointed at them.
Ron snorted, “Yeah, like a single one of you are going to get past my armor.” They all shifted their aim towards Cicero, who promptly threw up his hands.
“Put all your weapons and shields on the ground.” One of the gnomes demanded.
“Um.. I can’t” said Ron, “She’s very particular about not being let go. Tell them, dawnbringer.”
“At least turn it off,” Cicero said, “before they kill us.”
After they dropped all their weapons and shields and Ron turned off Dawnbringer, the gnomes had them file through one at a time, each of them surrounded by several gnomes. They took them through a few more gates before bringing them to an empty cavern made of rough worked stone. They lined them all up against a wall, and Cicero commented about how he hadn’t been in a line up since Neverwinter. “I never thought I’d actually miss these, but it kind of reminds me of home.”
One of the gnomes pronounced, “For the crime of releasing Jimjar, you are sentenced to death. Any requests before you die?”
Ron said, “F#@% you, I’m not going to die today,” and he drew his sword and started to charge.
Laughter erupted from the crowd and all the gnomes dropped their aim. Ron stopped mid charge, a bit confused. Then Jimjar came out from the crowd and said with a laugh, “Sorry, I was just curious for how far we could take it.” He tossed some coin to the gnome in the lead, and said, “I thought you’d figure me out right away, but Yosxim here thought he’d be able to do a convincing enough job that you wouldn’t catch on. I lost that bet. Come on, grab your stuff and I’ll take you into the city proper.”
Ron grumbled a bit, but Cicero laughed it off as they followed Jimjar into the city. As they made their way in, Yosxim said, pointing to Glabagool, “That thing can’t come into the city. Tell it to go away.”
Glabagool looked at Cicero and thought to him, “It’s ok, I will meet up with you later.” And it moved into a crack in the wall to leave the city.
Jimjar led them into the city proper, and once inside, it felt like a completely different world. The gnomes were no longer dour and mean, they were jovial and happy. The rooms and hallways were brightly lit with a combination of magic, bioluminescent fungus, and caged giant fire beetles. The walls were painted with bright colors. These deep gnomes seemed just like the gnomes on the surface once you got past their hardened exterior.
Cicero requested to go to the inn and Jimjar took them to The Foaming Mug, where they had rooms and beds for medium sized creatures. But more importantly, they had warm baths. For the first time in months, they were able to take a relaxing bath.
Note: Gaining the opportunity to actually take a bath in the Underdark and finally get a decent night’s rest, I’ve given my players inspiration for them to use. Sort of a nice little bonus for paying a premium at an inn.
They spent the evening drinking and relaxing. The inn keeper was excited to have an actual non-gnome visitor and talked them up the entire night, asking as many questions about their journey as he could. At some point, Topsy and Turvy dropped by with their own friends to brag about how they knew the visitors.
Note: Due to Jimjar, Topsy, and Turvy talking about the PCs to everyone they knew over the past few days, starting attitude of the settlement towards the PCs is indifferent instead of hostile.
The next morning, Jimjar took them to see the leaders of the community – Dorbo and Senni Diggermattock. After initial introductions, the Diggermattocks requested that the PCs tell them about everything they’ve seen. They’ve already heard reports from Jimjar, Topsy, and Turvy – now they want to hear it from the PCs themselves to see how accurate the stories are and if they’re lying (they inherently believe the deep gnomes first). Ron and Cicero told their adventures accurately and warned them of the demon lords they already knew about: Demogorgon, Zuggtmoy, and the Faceless Lord. Upon hearing that the ooze lord was here, they asked for help about an ooze problem they had.
Dorbo stood up and declared, “That’s it. ‘Operation: Ooze There?’ is now is process. I want you guys to investigate this ooze problem as see what you can do to stop it.” Dorbo also declared that ‘Operation: Exterminate?’ would be initiated, and he and Senni got into a little debate about what to do with the wererats. Dorbo wanted them to kill them off so the rooms could be opened up to hard working svirfneblin. Senni wanted them to find a peaceful resolution. Either way, they both wanted the PCs to help.
Cicero inquired about trying to get protection from the oozes – some acid resistance or something. Dorbo told him to talk to the local priest over at The Ruby in the Rough Temple.
And that’s where they went next – only to find out the priest was just an acolyte and his responsibilities were above his capabilities. He seemed overwhelmed, but promised to help in any way he could. Meanwhile, they could go over to the Speaking Stones and talk to one of the priests there. The Speaking Stones were practically next door to the temple, so it wasn’t difficult to find. One interesting thing they noted was that the priests could cast higher level spells so long as they were in the circle of stones themselves. “So that’s how they manage to summon and control the elementals” Cicero noted.
The priests at the Speaking Stones said he could assist against the oozes, but he had too many problems of his own. He needed to focus on his earth elementals, because the Ogremach Bane kept taking them. If someone didn’t get rid of that thing, he wouldn’t be able to help. Ron and Cicero volunteered to help, and he gave them a spell gem with the Hallow spell and told them to go to a temple and place the spell gem in a specific location where it would animate the Steadfast Stone menhirs, which would take care of the Ogremach Bane. In return, he would channel the divinity of the temple to give them a Blessing from Callarduran Smoothands.
They could pick from one of the three permanent boons:
1) +1 AC and all saves
2) Turn one non-magical weapon into a +1 weapon with the Returning property (my players all requested a way to have a single thrown weapon be reusable, so I added this part in)
3) Resistance to Acid Damage and Advantage vs acid saving throws (this came from the request to have a defense against the oozes)
Lastly, they went to the market. Finally, there was a place where they could sell their collected treasures they’ve acquired since they fled the drow. They tried to sell stuff in Gracklstugh, but the city’s ban against art made selling their art objects very difficult. Neverlight Grove just didn’t have a monetary system for them to actually sell anything. Sloobludop was destroyed before they could visit the market. They added up everything they had in gems, jewelry, art objects and they realized that they had nearly 15,000 gp worth of treasure. So they went on a spending spree and purchased some magical gear.
I found an online magic item shop generator to represent which items were present in the market at the time they were there, from the various vendors and traders. Most of the armor was built for small characters, which wasn’t very useful for our PCs, and a lot of it was well out of their price range, but they did find some useful magical equipment – mostly consumables. In addition, Ron gifted Lux Veridian, his fire mace (of gnomish make), to Topsy and Turvy.
List of Magical Items Owned by the PCs:
Ron: Dawnbringer (intelligent longsword with the Sun Sword properties), Requiem (+1 heavy mithral shield that echoes a song of night when struck, made by the fey; glows blue in the moonlight), and a quiver that grants temp HP when a foe is defeated (temp HP = CR of creature killed).
Aryndren: Tome of Insight (+2 Wisdom), Druid’s Collar that grants +1 Nature checks, and a Potion of Barkskin (+2).
Cicero: Cobble (+1 Dagger made of stone), Unnamed +1 Rapier made of bone and allows the use to speak the language of the undead, a cape with four uses of heroism, and a set of +2 leather drow armor made for a female.
Group: Stone Salve, Wand of Shatter (24 charges left, doesn’t recharge), Wand of Eagle’s Splender (46 charges left, doesn’t recharge, grants +4 Charisma for 1 hour). Some other stuff that is on their character sheets but they’re too busy to find their sheets to let me know what they have. I should keep a log of this stuff somehow.
Edit: they also have the following as part of their group magical items: Oil of magic vestment. Scroll see invisibility. Wand of greater healing glows near trolls (2 charges remaining). Oil of bless weapon. Potion of displacement
Fate of NPCs:
Bupiddo – Dead, executed
Eldeth – Sent Home from Gracklstugh, fate unknown
Jimjar – Safely Home in Blingdenstone
Ront – Sent Home from Gracklstugh, fate unknown
Shuushar – Safely (?) Home in Sloobludop
Stool – Safely Home in Neverlight Grove
Topsy and Turvy – Safely Home in Blingdenstone
Glabagool – Somewhere outside of Blingdenstone
Escaped Slaves – Sent Home from Gracklstugh, fate unknown
Four Myconid Sprouts - Left to join the Myconid Dance in Gracklstugh
Currently with the party
Derendil
Sarith
Fargas
Yuk Yuk and Spiderbait
Dawnbringer
2 Hook Horror Infants (named Beaky and Clawz)
2 Orcs (Kogan and Ig)
Berk, an escaped slave that stayed loyal to Brin
Brin, previous PC that is no longer able to attend game due to work schedule conflicts (keeping him as an NPC in case he can make it again)
As a reminder, we’re still using the wonderful NPC cards made by Goober on the GitP forums.
I'm always surprised about how many NPCs there are in your party. Do your PCs control any of them? Does the DM spend a lot of time talking to himself? Are there thrice as many NPCs as PCs? Do they all travel together and go around on adventures together? Or do some stay "home" a lot?
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I'm always surprised about how many NPCs there are in your party. Do your PCs control any of them? Does the DM spend a lot of time talking to himself? Are there thrice as many NPCs as PCs? Do they all travel together and go around on adventures together? Or do some stay "home" a lot?
They all travel as a group. Because I'm using the NPC cards, each NPC that's on a card is attached to a PC and they control that particular NPC. Each PC can have a number of NPC cards up to their charisma modifier (min 1). The rest I control. They generally don't contribute to the party unless there's a specific reason for the story or they're specifically addressed by a PC. This helps speed up gameplay while still keeping a lot of NPC support within the party.
The primary concerns for the players is they have to provide food and water, and account for space (such as on a boat) for all the NPCs. I generally do not target NPCs in combat and they don't get used in combat - this is the trade off for the NPC Cards. Instead of having them as their own separate character, the give minor benefits to the PC they're assigned to. Occasionally I do target an NPC or allow them to attack on their own if it improves the story (back in Sloobludop, I allowed all the NPCs with Ron to join in the fight against Kuo-Toa cultists and actually make attack rolls).
During times when the party is stopped, I just say that people are in small groups talking amongst themselves. I'll also have an NPC speak up if the players aren't getting an idea I want them to have or if they need an opinion from a new perspective. I've occasionally had them argue amongst themselves, but as a GM I don't like to take up all the spotlights from my players - I want the NPCs to be support or at least contribute to the story, I don't want it to be me speaking all night as my players just watch. So I only use them as much as needed to drive the story or support the PCs, and no more.
Oh, that's cool. That's a neat system. I'm glad it's working out for all of you. :-D