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Keep On The Shadowfell: Session 2 December 10, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, DM, Keep on the Shadowfell, Narrative.
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Well, for maybe the first time in my brief DMing history, I had the exact same group of people for two weeks in a row. That certainly helps to bring a greater sense of cohesion to the story. I am a fan of that type of gaming set up. Anyway, on to the meat.

Heavy Roleplay

I introduced a heavy amount of non-encounter roleplaying this session. Beginning with the arrival in town and discussion between the party and the gate guard and ending with the characters interacting with the townspeople in the local tavern, the first hour or so of our game session consisted entirely of roleplaying.

I actually had a lot of fun with it at first, but I could tell that it was dragging on for my players before too long. None of us are experienced tabletop RPGers, so I think it was a little uncomfortable for my players. At times they seemed to enjoy the accents and voices that I would do, but at other times they seemed a little put off by the “scene” that I was creating. More than anything else, it just seemed like they had no idea what to do without  map and visuals at which to look.

I think that I need to find a way to ease them into it better. First of all, I will shorten the amount of time that they are required to spend roleplaying. At those times when everyone is just sitting around not knowing what to do, I will have an NPC come and directly engage them in a “leading” conversation. Perhaps for now, roleplaying for this group will basically consist of detective-style roleplaying, where the only times we actually sit down and force the roleplay is when information is needed.

What Was Good

Jed (Carlsberg Torres) seemed to understand immediately that roleplaying can be whatever he wants it to be. He immediately started having fun with his freedom to act out Carlsberg’s personality, ordering some drinks (he wanted to roll to see how many shots his character would do) and then heading to the piano to play some songs. As soon as I mentioned some of the other patrons in the tavern–and that one was a half-elf woman–he decided to go over and get to know her. I must also give credit to Jen (Phillip Rivers) for her wanting there to be a stage (like for karaoke) in the Inn. That was where Carlsberg got the idea to play a song.

Where We Faltered

It wasn’t until Jed started partying that the others began to see the light that there was more to this game than just simply rolling die. However, my other 3 players didn’t ever seem to fully embrace it like Jed did/does.

Even roleplaying in the sense as a plot-driving force for the game did not seem to fully make sense to them. So, I am thinking to re-explain the benefits of roleplaying as a form of detective work; it is the manner of information gathering. At least initially, if they can understand that there is a purpose to roleplaying, then I think they will be open to it (again, as long as it does not take up too much of the game time).

Another thing that made it difficult was that I did not always know how to appropriately convey information. I wanted them to mee tthe cast of characters so I introduced Eilian, Sylvana, and Ninaran in the tavern. They were all intrigued immediately by Ninaran’s sour demeanor and flocked to talk to her. I had decided to make her character very stand-offish (like the module describes her), but this form of response only intrigued them more. We spent a LONG time roleplaying a situation that was just really not going anywhere. They couldn’t grasp that she was unimportant at that time and that she would not offer anything of value to them (again, at that time). I imagine that this was my fault for not finding a way to make that more clear sooner or changing my approach so that she did suddenly become more engaging, because she realized that she could lead them all on a wild goose hunt or something. I don’t know.

“A Ha!” Moment

In the end, the party found lodging and, despite initial failure in talking Sylvana Wrafton into letting them stay there for free, found that saving Korg’s supplies and horses on the road brought an unexpected reward; Sylvana and Korg are good friends, so when Korg entered the Inn, shouting praises of the heroes exploits, the Innkeeper found plenty of motivation to treat the adventurers differently.

Another Kobold Attack

After gathering enough info and getting a rough map from Eilian (the old drunken cogder), the party got a good night’s rest. The next morning they headed off to the Dragon Burial Site to find Douven Staul. A good ways down the road and outside of town, they were once again ambushed by kobolds. These ones seemed pissed and like they wanted revenge for their fallen comrades (the ones that the adventurers had killed on their way to town). The fight went well enough for the PCs, the kobolds never really offering that much of a challenge to the heroes. At one point Periwinkle the Eladrin Swordmage teleported on top of a nearby rock and cut his sword down into the skull of the kobold standing just below him. That seemed to be a highpoint for him on a night when far too many of his rolls just seemed ineffective.

That is all for now. I believe that it will be a little while before we are able to play again, so I may have some bits and tiddles from a different game before the next write-up. Good night.

Keep On The Shadowfell: Session 1 November 16, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, DM, Narrative.
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Background Info

The basic story I have going for my players is that a wizard named Vellan the Mulleted (this picture doesn’t do that mullet justice; it is beautiful) has contacted each of them, recruiting them to join his secret band of do-gooders. His friend Douven Staul has been missing for a month now and he is hoping that these young heroes will be able to locate Douven, proving themselves worthy in the process.

Vellan also requested, as a personal favor to him, that the party help escort a half-orc merchant named Korg (idea stolen from here) to Winterhaven and assure his safe passage to and arrival there. Korg is a semi-crippled, trade-goods wagoneer and hardly worth anything in a fight. His half-full cart was drawn by a single large horse.

The party tonight consisted of four level one characters:

  • Carlsberg Torres (male human ranger with sub-class feat of rogue) who prefers to use throwing daggers/knives and attack from afar.
  • Joan Padraig, eldest daughter of Ernest and Vanessa Padraig (idea also stolen and then adapted from here – female human warlord with the inspire build). She ran away from home at the age of 16, so this will be her first trip back home in three years.
  • Phillip Rivers (yes, named after the quarterback) is the wizard of the party (female eladrin wizard, control build).
  • Periwinkle is the last of the party (male eladrin swordmage, aegis of assault).

The couple playing the two eladrin are married to each other in real life. They played two sessions of the 3.5e Basic Game with me last year. This was their first time with 4e and third time playing D&D ever. They did very well. My wife played Joan and this was easily the most excited I have ever seen her for any semblance of back story or character development.

Combat Highlight

The party began getting ambushed by those dirty little kobolds. Carlsberg was up front and center for the initial kobold minion charge. Two of them hit him, decently damaging him before any PCs had a turn. Phillip was the furthest back and decided to play it safe by climbing a nearby tree. She then sent out a spell of icy terrain to hurt the kobolds and knock them prone (not knowing that they only had 1 hp). Unfortunately Carlsberg was standing in that burst as well. He was hit, suffering max damage, and knocked prone from the spell. Then, by the end of the round, the kobold slinger launched his gluepot at Carlsberg, immobilizing him. It was certainly a rough round for Mr. Torres.Yet, he survived it alright, laying a pretty nasty smackdown on some kobolds before all was said and done.

The Skill Challenge

The idea behind this one was simply that the heroes were to get Korg and his goods safely to Winterhaven. They did, therefore I gave them 75 XP (It was 3 successes before 3 failures in the end, which is less than Complexity 1). The kobold slinger–who was mercilessly being attacked by Periwinkle–thought to escape by creating some confusion. He launched a firepot at the horse attached to Korg’s wagon. The firepot landed at the horse’s feet, causing the horse to rear back and then bolt forward, heading directly up the old King’s Road toward the heroes and the last kobold dragonshield.

Phillip, still hiding out about 10′ up in the tree, attempted to leap out onto the horse. Due to a low roll but clever story-telling/role-playing by the girl playing Phillip, we decided that she panicked at the last minute and spun around, grabbing the branch again. The rest of her turn was spent letting go of the branch and falling to the ground. This of course was the first failure in the skill challenge.

A whole round went by as the other heroes finished off the last two kobolds (the dragonshield’s head being lopped off by Joan and Periwinkle’s ferocious stabbing in the back of the slinger as it tried to flee) The cart continued forward, gaining speed just a few feet away from crashing into Joan and Carlsberg. Phillip ran alongside the cart, jumping/climbing atop it and grabbing the reins from the fairly useless Korg. This was the first success. Next, Joan leaped directly onto the horse’s back (she rolled a very high athletics check) to help rein it in. This was the second success. I counted the destruction of the kobolds as the third success and decided that it wasn’t worth dragging out that little scene any further. So I gave them some XP for successfully defending Korg and his goods upon their reaching the town of Winterhaven.

I really like the idea of the skill challenge. I can tell that I’ll need more time to get the kinks straightened out, but I thought it was a great way to add a different element to the encounter so the battle didn’t have to drag out as long. It also gave Phillip–who had not played as large a role in the fighting after the first round–a chance to shine and flex her creative muscles. I think she enjoyed that part of the game the most.

As far as XP goes, I am not sure if I short-changed them. It seemed like the skill challenge was a pretty easy one, so I didn’t think it was deserving of a ton of XP, but I want to reward the girls especially for stepping up to the role playing table and doing a great job. Any thoughts on how much XP should be awarded in this situation?

To End

The party arrived in Winterhaven as the sun was setting. The guards began to question them until one of them noticed the Lady Joan Padraig, returned home after 3 years of absense. He directed the other heroes to Wrafton’s Inn and we closed down shop for the night.

A New Page Turns November 13, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in Uncategorized.
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This is the first new post that I will have started for many months. Recently I’ve been catching up on finishing old drafts that I had started but never finished.

This Sunday I will be running Keep on the Shadowfell for the first time. I have had a few practice runs with pre-made adventures now and for the most part felt like they met with success. I also learned a lot from them about encounter design and specifically terrain design.

The area where I know that I am the weakest is role playing. That is the part that interests me the most right now, but it is the part that I have experienced the least and therefore with which I feel the most uncomfortable.

My hope is that skill challenges will provide an easily understandable way for my players to begin down that path. Anyway, I don’t really plan on doing anymore write-ups for my 3.5e Eberron campaign. We are going to play again on Saturday (it has been a REALLY long time since the last time we played), but unless something incredibly noteworthy occurs, I feel like my time and efforts need to go more toward providing the most enjoyable experience for my players as possible. So, until further notice, Fetalus and friends will be silently adventuring, far far away from the interwebs.

Barney’s Adventures: A Close November 10, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, Barney's Adventures, DM, Narrative.
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I am going to write this from the retconned perspective that the only adventurers to enter or fight in the cave were our 3 heroes and Clarence, Barney’s man-servant. Also, it has been many months since this was actually played and I am having to rely entirely on my poor excuse for a memory. So this will be more summary than play-by-play. It should also be noted that I am combining the events of two game nights into one narrative.

What Happened

The Cave Entrance – The heroes found their way into the cave entrance behind the waterfall and gained a surprise attack on the few goblins there. As their skirmish escalated, the party could hear the very loud creaking of metal on rock, followed by the heavy footsteps of something obviously large. An orc captain came charging into the melee, giving the heroes their first taste of a sizable opponent (as opposed to foes whose strength came in their numbers). The fight dragged on for a while, but eventually the party dispatched their enemies and went down the passage from whence had come the orc.

Deeper into the Darkness – They found a large metal door leading into a system of well-constructed tunnels. They descended the stairs and entered a small cross section of the underground passages. They could hear some soft humming coming from behind one of the doors and cautiously approached. inside they found a small goblin humming and singing to himself as he gathered supplies from what was obviously a supply closet. They captured him and intimidated him into answering their questions. Despite his protests, they dragged him along behind them to guide them to the Dark Lady’s room, where she was holding the Bloodstone. With the goblin as their guide, they were able to bypass what would have surely been a grueling process of trial by elimination. The goblin led them directly and safely to the Dark Lady’s chambers. They crashed through the doors and began to battle the Dark Lady and her zombie minions.

The Final Battle – Things go decently well for the heroes at first, but it soon becomes apparent that the longer they stay there, the more danger they are in of being discovered and trapped–a few goblins had already heard the ruckus and come to investigate. Elfomoto decides that more direct measures are necessary. He finds enough space to make a quick sprint toward the Dark Lady, who is standing directly in front of the podium on which the Bloodstone rests, and successfully flips over her–dodging her attacks of opportunity–safely landing on the other side of the podium. Using the podium itself as a shield from attacks, he safely uses some cloth to pick up and store the Bloodstone. The battle rages on with neither side making strong strides toward victory. In a moment of distraction, Elfomoto is able to quickly climb atop the podium and perform a similar move as the one that got him where he is, and he gracefully flips over danger, narrowly missing the numerous swinging blades of his foes. He lands safely and yells to his comrades that they should flee.

A Sad Farewell – A few members of the party are pretty badly wounded by this point. Barney is very close to death and Clarence even more near that black end. Carlsberg and Elfomoto begin to make their retreat, helping Barney as best they can, but it soon becomes apparent that Clarence is unable to keep pace with them. Barney tried to get back to help him, but watches as his man-servant is cut down. Barney is heartbroken and fires off one last killing spell, buying time for him and his friends to flee down the hall and out of the tunnels. The three heroes return the Bloodstone, claim their reward, and Barney mourns the loss of his friend and slave. His indomitable spirit won’t stay down long, though… He already has plans for getting a better servant in the future.

Thoughts

This was the last night that my step-brother had to play before heading out-of-state for college. What happened well is that we had fun. What could have been better was for me to not try to put so much into that final session. I had tons of fun treasures and surprises for them to discover during their search of the underground lair. However, due to time constraints, most of those plans were basically set aside or left ignored. This makes me sad not because I felt like my hard work had gone unappreciated (which is a common frustration for DMs I have read–and therefore expect to experience), but because better planning could have let them discover these things in conjunction with their more direct approach to the game.

They didn’t even have or take the time to loot the bodies of the dead goblins, so even if I had been smart enough to just drop that treasure/loot in at the end, they didn’t stay long enough to grab it.

The truth is that I am not too worried because I don’t think the players know that they have not been receiving as much loot as is probably considered “standard” in the world of D&D. However, I do want to make sure that they are getting enough incentives to develop their characters. My hope is to incorporate their getting better treasure into the plotlines and hooks so they feel some real accomplishment in upgrading.

What I am proud of is that my first time running 4e I did not have to rely on pre-made adventures. I actually want to try one, but I may wait until I start school again to do that, just because I have the time to plan some good ones while I am out of school right now.

Eberron: The Mournlands November 10, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 3.5e, Eberron, Narrative, PC.
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Failan leaves the party at the edge of the Mournlands and refuses any offers for additional pay to carry them in. Lia suggests that the party holds hands as they enter the thick mists that lay heavy over and throughout the area. This turns out to be a brilliant idea, because as soon as we enter the noxious cloud, all of us except for Lia are disoriented and can hardly see a few feet in front of us. Lia is able to maintain a clear head and directional bearing, though so the party, continuing to hold hands, begins their trek through what Fetalus is calling the Mournfog.

Soon they come across an older model of a catapult that looks to have seen use recently, but the war has been over for 4 years. The party begins to investigate, until they notice the corpses of soldiers nearby that look fresh. They were killed by a hailstorm of arrows that littered their bodies and the ground nearby. They begin to search the horizon and see in the distance a battlefield filled with corpses. They decide that the time has come to move on, but not until they discover some goods in and near the bodies that lay close to the catapult.

The party finds some pretty useful loot. Ana finds a symbiont sword that is willing to bond with her due to her elf heritage. Lia (I think) finds a pretty sweet little boomerang that should provide some fun for her, and Fetalus discovers a wand of magic missile. He giggles excitedly in his youthful manner at this wonderful find.

They continue their trek across the wasteland, soon encountering some nasty little skeletons that fight like they have a reason to care. During or soon after dispatching these bony foes, a massive corpse crab surfaces from the sand, ready to lay a thorough beat down to the heroes. The fight rages on for some time before they finally injure the crab enough for it to decide that killing the party is not worth it if it costs him his own life as well. He flees and burrows himself into the sand.

Continuing their trek, the party soon finds the cave entrance for which they have been searching. Despite Ana’s best attempts to calm Wolfie, he is inconsolable and will not enter the dark and creepy cave. The party leaves him above ground, hoping for his safety as they descend into the darkness.

Eberron: Useful Information November 10, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 3.5e, Eberron, Narrative, PC.
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This weekend we were able to play our Eberron campaign again. We ended last time right as Fetalus and crew were entering a large, glass-covered ruin to search for information on where to find the schema.

The Map Room

As soon as they enter they see a dwarf zombie, and two fighters (one of which is a female). Wolfie sprints into the melee, biting the dwarf zombie and tripping him to the ground.

Lia rains arrows onto the foes, dealing damage occasionally (her rolling was very hit and miss). Fetalus, thinking he understood flanking rules, decides to swing around the room to cast a spell at the female fighter, who it was becoming obvious was the leader of this little squad. The female fighter immediately sprints at Fetalus the first chance she gets and takes him on. He luckily escapes the initial melee without too much damage and begins to use fight and flight tactics, until Lia can manage to get in close enough to help out. Eventually, the zombie and male fighter are destroyed and the party takes the leader down–Fetalus happily dealing the final blow.

They find some excellent loot on the bodies of the room’s most recently dead persons. Then, the room itself is searched, where clues to the next schema are found. After understanding that the clues carved into the statues in the room relate to points on the giant map on the floor, the group discovers that it is in the foothills of Cyre that the schema will be found. They destroy the clue on the statue, to keep the Emerald Claw from following behind them, and leave the building. As soon as they step outside, they come across a vampiric-looking fellow who seems less than pleased to find adventurers exiting one of the buildings in his site (he is the head of the Emerald Claw crew). After some successful bluffing, Lia convinces him that the room was already destroyed when they went in and that they know nothing of a schema or whatever. A battle almost ensues, but instead the man disappears in a pissed-off flash, obviously intent on relaying information somewhere, despite his obvious desire to kill the annoying fools caught trespassing on his dig.

The party flees the scene and begins the trek to the foothills of Cyre (in the Mournlands). While traveling, Fetalus works with Prince Phillip (his familiar toad) to train him in a level of bard (it actually was just one bard-like ability: the Croak of Courage, which gives a slight bonus to Fetalus). This cost Fetalus some XP, but he was willing to pay it, because nothing sounded cooler to him at the time than Phillip belching out a Croak of Courage at some incredibly needed moment, when Fetalus has lost hope and is about to give up (you may be able to tell that this will not be a power or ability that gets too overused–it was a flavor thing, because Fetalus loves his little toad so much, that he is inspired to fight harder to protect him).

Barney’s Adventures: Lessons Learned November 6, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, Barney's Adventures, DM.
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I learned a great lesson about DMing the other night; there are limits to how many people you can let play in a game. I have frequently heard (read) that 5-6 players is the ideal or target number. If your gaming group meets the following requirements that could easily be true: (a) all, or maybe most, have played before and are thus at least semi-experienced–so as to keep the game from slowing down and becoming boring; (b) everybody actually does want to play. I had a night that was pretty homework free, so I acquiesced to run another game for my bro and friends. I was very excited, because I had planned further in advance for the last time we got together and had thus already done quite a bit of the prep work. I could spend time on further encounters and on fine-tuning the ones for our session. Things looked good until…way more people showed up than expected.

Instead of the 6 that I had planned on (mind you the largest group that I’ve ever run was 4 and that was the very simplified 3.5e Basic Set version), we had 8 people show up (only 7 planned on playing). To top it off, my little bro didn’t tell the three people he brought what we were playing, because he thought they’d say, “No,” because… well, let’s face it; D&D does not always have the greatest reputation amongst the general populace.

Things actually did not go nearly as badly as they could have. It seemed like most everybody had fun, but not everyone had fun for the same reasons (i.e. because they actually enjoyed the game). What was worse is that, once my wife and her friend got back from playing tennis, it was pandemonium. It was very hard to get everyone to focus on the game, because it felt like a half hour for each round to go by. One of the girls in particular grew tired of the wait (or the game)  and began to take that mentality of, “If I’m bored, then the only way to have fun is to sabotage the game.” She decided to attack my little bro on her next turn, and rolled well, dealing a ton of damage. Luckily, everyone really was having a good time, and, even thought my little bro was totally upset at being attacked, he thought it was funny and played into the idea that everyone would be ganging up on the traitor that had just turned on the group.

The three newbies had to leave right after her turn it turned out, so we just retconned that whole attack scene, got rid of some PCs and monsters (to make it balanced for the lower levels) and carried on our merry little way. The whole “add 4 PCs to the party without any making it fit story wise, and then taking those same 4 PCs away mid-battle” could easily make quite a few players unhappy and/or annoyed, but in all actuality, the core guys that I have getting together weren’t bugged at all. They are just starting to grasp the idea of an overarching storyline that exists between and connecting the little one-shot encounters that they thought I was putting together. Now it is starting to sink in that these encounters can expand to cover multiple sessions and a continuous storyline. They seemed excited about that.

So for now I have decided that my preferred PC count is 4. 3 works out pretty much just as well as 4 for me, but 4 allows me enough room to bring in some fun foes for them to face without making it too tough, and it still keeps a great pace to the game. Once my little bro leaves town again to go back up to school, then I’ll try to get my wife back intot he little group of my other three friends and that ought to be perfect.

Barney’s Adventures: The Cave Entrance November 6, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, Barney's Adventures, DM, Narrative.
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It has been a while since I have played D&D. Life will do that to you I guess. Anyway, I have a few of these recap posts already drafted on here, so I will revise/finish those and put them up. So, here we go.

When last we met, the adventurers had just dispatched a nasty pack of wolves in the forest and then rested for the night.

The next day the three adventurers (and Clarence) take to the road again, but only briefly as they soon decide to veer off into the woods. Soon, as they wander along, heading West, Carlsberg spots a small wooden watchtower, well-hidden amongst the tops of the trees. He also sees a small goblin peering over the top with a crossbow trained directly at him. He breaks off into a run, trying to get some cover and circle around the tower, but the goblin (sharpshooter, lvl 2) gets a shot off that deals some heavy damage, and two goblins (runner, lvl 1) step out to block his path through the trail. One of them lands a nasty blow against Carlsberg, immediately making him change his plans. Barney, having no desire to enter a battle while crossbow bolts are rained down upon them, casts Mage Hand as a minor move, grasping the light crossbow and yanking it from the hands of the goblin before he has any clue what has happened (I was so impressed with my little bro’s cleverness in this that I had to let him do it. I did roll, but I made the strength check the goblin gave have a penalty due to the surprise–the roll was so low it wouldn’t have mattered anyway). Barney then moves toward the two goblin runners and casts Cloud of Daggers on the one that had landed the blow on Carlsberg. The goblin takes some significant damage.

Clarence grabs his cart of ale and heads for cover in the trees to the side and below the tower–the artillery no longer being a threat.

Elfomoto makes his way over to the melee, circling around the goblin runner (the same with the cloud of daggers over him) and makes a flanking attack against him, dealing some more damage.

Carlsberg makes his first sneak attack of the game on the goblin whose attention is now focused on Elfomoto, the obvious and immediate threat. He drives his dagger into the back of the neck of the goblin, dropping him immediately to the ground.

At this point, the goblin sharpshooter was climbing down the tower, fuming about losing his crossbow. Clarence sees him, picks up a rock and hurls it at the goblin, striking him directly in the back of the head, knocking him loose from the ladder to fall down and receive some fairly nasty damage to his head (both from the rock and from landing on it poorly). The goblin takes a couple of rounds to become undazed. By that time, the other remaining goblin runner had been grabbed as he tried to flee, and the party had surrounded the sharpshooter. They tied them to the tower, stripped them of their belongings, and began to question them, asking about how to find the cave entrance. They learned that someone the goblins called the dark lady was in charge and that the cave entrance was behind the waterfall.

They leave the goblins tied to the tower and make their way toward the waterfall cave entrance.

Barney’s Adventures: The Bloodstone July 24, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, Barney's Adventures, DM, Narrative.
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Raids

The basic story was that the town they live in had recently been plagued by a series of attacks and thefts, culminating in the theft of a powerful stone from the mayor’s manor. The mayor was furious to no end and desperate to get back his stone. He offered this ragtag group of adventurers 400gp each to retrieve the dark red stone for him, paying 100 up front and the remaining 300 when the bloodstone (as he called it) was returned. He was very hesitant to give any information about the stone–what it was, where it was from, what it could do, why it was so valuable–other than to say that they must not touch it with their bare flesh. He was adamant that they not do this, warning them repeatedly.

They set off down the trail leading away from town to the West, looking for some caves that are rumored to be infested with some goblins (the mayor was confident that these goblins were behind the theft). As they travel along, Barney spots a flash of white through the dense section of forest to their South. He grows curious and decides–against the advice of Elfomoto (elf ranger)–to check it out. Both he, Clarence (Barney’s hired slave/caddy), and Carlsberg (human rogue) head into the forest, while Elfomoto tarries at the edge, debating whether or not it is worth it to go in after them. Right as they approach a clearing in the woods where they can see four wolves, both Barney and Carlsberg step onto dried twigs that snap loudly enough to draw the attention of the wolves. The wolves immediately move to attack.

Elfomoto hears the commotion and begins to make his way into the woods, while the others begin to battle. With one of the wolves being so obviously bigger than the others, Barney focuses his attacks on it (Dire Wolf). He casts Cloud of Daggers on the wolf, but it does not do as much damage as he had hoped it would (it missed, only doing half damage). The battle wages on with a bit of a stalemate for the first  round, with no one landing anything more than a minor blow against their adversary. Clarence decides to attempt a climb up the nearest tree, where he could both hide and hurl a rock down at the wolf attacking his master. He gets about 6 ft. up the tree when he slips and falls down, spraining his ankle. He spends the rest of the battle rolling around behind the tree, whimpering and nursing his pain.

Carlsberg grows frustrated with the slow, back and forth nature of the battle, and–having just seen Clarence attempt to use the trees to his advantage–decides that he would spice things up by attempting to climb up a nearby tree, flip off of it (over the nearest wolf minion), fling a dagger down into the neck of the wolf while in mid-air, and land behind it. Things begin well as he leaps up, grabbing the branch just over his head, and swings himself up and over the wolf, doing an incredibly graceful gymnastic-style flip (natural 20). As he flips over the wolf, he grabs a dagger and flings it down at the wolf’s neck, missing it by a good foot or two (rolled a 2), and then attempts to land directly on the wolf. Again, he misses the wolf by a good foot or two (rolling a 1), and takes some damage as he tumbles to the ground and ends prone.

Elfomoto arrives and begins his horrific destruction of the dire wolf, landing blow after blow of heavy damage. Very soon he has sliced both deep into the wolf’s flank and landed a terrible blow to the tender shoulder/neck area of the wolf’s left front limb. The wolf also continues to take small amounts of damage from the cloud of daggers. Barney dispatches the wolf minion closest to him by first dousing him with ale (Beer Splash – Minor Action that I made for Barney, given that his implement is a mug of ale) and casting Scorching Blast, which absolutely lit up the poor creature in a fiery ball of flames.

Down on the ground now, Carlsberg fends off an attack by the same wolf that he attempted to kill/mount, and then slashes his dagger across the throat of the wolf, immediately spilling its blood all over himself and ending the minion’s life. He debates taking the time right then to capture some of the wolf’s fresh blood in a vial for later experimentation (he loves his alchemy), but in the end decides that killing the last remaining wolf first is more important. He spends his move to stand up. The dire wolf makes an attack on Elfomoto, but as it does it puts too much pressure on its front left limb, stumbling down to the ground (rolled a 1). Elfomoto wastes no time in taking advantage of this situation, dealing massive damage with each of his blades against his now prone foe.

Barney hurls a small splash of acid at the obviously dying dire wolf, and between the acid and on-going cloud of dagger damage, the wolf does not make it long enough to attack again.

The party used a tremendous amount of resources (encounter/daily powers) during the fight, so they rest for the night before deciding to continue West toward the cave.

Barney’s Adventures July 22, 2009

Posted by elopingcamel in 4e, Barney's Adventures, DM, One Shot.
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This afternoon I received another text from my step-brother saying that he was in town and wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons again. I was more than happy to oblige the man. He came over along with two of my friends (one had played the 3.5e Basic Set module with me last summer when I was first trying my hand at DMing, the other has been my friend for a LONG time but had never expressed any interest in a game like D&D).

I am truly growing to love these random, very loosely planned, one-shot adventures that my little bro requests. I never have much time to plan them, and therefore they are never taken too seriously. It helps me to set aside the perfectionist in me and just relax so we all can have a good time. Plus, I am learning so much each time we play about what is fun (and what is not) for the players.

My friend, who had played a year ago, is much more into character creation and the role-playing aspect of the game–he would gladly take a penalty to a roll if it is due to a decision that his character would make in that situation. He came over with the idea in his head (remember, his knowledge of character creation in regards to mechanics–as well as the mechanics of gameplay–is minimal at best) of a sneaky guy that is not physically strong at all, but is very quick and agile. His character would use throwing daggers as his main weapon, but for up close melee combat, a form of a handaxe (he actually did not want a handaxe, but that was the closest we could find for what he was trying to describe) would be his weapon of choice. He wanted this character to be a potions master, who relied heavily on potions to augment and make up for his weaknesses. In my limited experience, what he was looking for was some mix between a rogue and an artificer. For the sake of time, we quick-drew up a rogue that would use throwing daggers and be a trickster build. As his melee weapon I used the kukri (that almost looks like a handaxe in a weird way, no?).

My other friend played a dual-blade wielding elf ranger. He was more than happy to just use one of the many many pregen characters that I had rolled up when I found DDI’s character creator freeware version thingie. The only thing he said when we first started to play was that he wanted an archer-style character (he was afraid of the up close combat to some degree I believe), but as soon as the first battle started, he abandoned the ranged style of combat and got up in the mix of things. So… go figure.

I’ll give a narrative summary of what happened later.