Nappendixia Campaign Session Report
Session #- 34 Session Date- 2/22/23 Time Passed- 2 days 2/22-2/23
Roll Call- Boneripper- Half Orc Fighter 6
Zellmax- Gnome Thief 6
Hellenna- Human Druid 7
Thanquil- Elf Magic User 6
20 Heavy Foot Men at Arms
5 Short Bow Archers
Adventure Log- The party arrives at the ruined tower from their journey from Fort Turjmir on the evening of the 22nd. They make their way to the top of the hill and search the tower. It appears to be in the same state they left it from their prior trip. Needing to rest for the night they set up defensive positions in the tower and sent out Zellmax to scout the area. He and Thanquil decide to trade magic items, Zellmax’s robe of blending for Thanquil’s elven cloak. The cloak is much more effective for the thief as he can use it while moving slowly, but the robe cannot be used while moving. Now much more effective as a scout, Zellmax searches the base of the hill and entrance to the dungeon. No creatures seem to be about, but at the entrance to the dungeon he sees a horrific sight- a large puddle of dried blood, curiously no corpse or blood trail led away from the scene, so it's unclear what happened here. He returns to the group and they guard the tower carefully all night with nothing disturbing them. The next morning they enter the dungeon with their archers and 15 spearmen, they leave 5 outside the dungeon entrance to guard.
From the main hallway they decide to take the secret door on the right to head back to the SE corner of the dungeon where they previously found the throne room and fought the living statue columns. Zellmax scouts ahead down a long corridor going east, noting a few doors to the south and a passageway heading north. However, as he headed east, he noticed lantern light
And a collection of footmen and archers guarding at a vestibule that dead ends at the eastern end of the corridor. He sneaks back to the group to report and form a plan. They decide to surprise them with spells, hoping they will go off before the guards can react. Thanquil begins casting web and Helenna casts produce flame with the plan to web the guards then ignite the flames to damage them. The guards are not surprised but do win initiative. The archers fire out at the party, striking a spearman, one spearman rushes forward to engage, but the rest hold in the vestibule. The spell web goes off trapping all but one guard. Zellmax slyly backstabs the guard, dropping him. The guards engage the webbed mercenaries, and Hellenna hurls her fire, immolating the webs and slaying the trapped guards. They had been yelling out for “Darlene” to come help them, obviously their leader. Answering the call, a secret door at the rear of the vestibule opens and out comes a woman fighter in plate with a spear. She looks about at the party trying to determine who is in charge. Unsure, she attacks into the group of guards, dropping 2, all the time yelling out “Who are you? Why are you attacking us?” Unfazed by her likely ruse, the party pushes the attack. Helenna casts insect swarm on the fighter and she is covered in insects and begins taking damage. She staggers back into the open secret door where she has a few more archers and spearmen guards, dropping her finely crafted spear as she claws at the insects on her face. The party presses into the room and slays another spearman. With that Helenna says she will dismiss the insects if the fighter and her surviving guards leave immediately and leave their treasure behind. Defeated, she leaves her spear behind and departs with 9 remaining guards. The party agrees to be wary, this is probably not the last time they encounter the fighter Darlene. After their departure, they search the bedroom behind the secret door. Modestly furnished, they find several thousand in silver and one thousand electrum, and Thanquil identifies the spear to be a +2 spear, which Helenna takes. Thanquil also finds 2 secret doors during the search, one leading back to the throne room, and one leading back to the room in the far SE corner. After searching and gathering treasure, they remember about the 5 spearmen they had placed on guard at the dungeon entrance, and the fact that Darlene and her troops would have encountered them on the way out. They head out to discover a scene of combat. 4 of the guards lay dead, 3 from spear points, and one from an arrow to the throat. One of Darlene’s men also lies dead at the scene, the fifth of the party’s guards is missing. Wary of future attacks from Darlene, but also knowing she is down to only 8 remaining troops, they head up to secure the tower, rest, watch for future attacks, and plan another delve into the dungeon. They will be able to camp and watch from the tower until next session.
Boot Hill- The injured members of the party are coming out of bedrest this session, so activity picked back up in the Boot Hill world.
2/4/23- Turnpike Kid is well enough to get out of bedrest. Still wounded but recovering he goes to the local saloon looking for a drink and looking for work. After a chat with the bartender/ owner he is offered a job as a Bouncer at the Roadhouse Saloon. (Hired gun salary -1$ a day for room and board). TPK negotiates Sundays off and begins work on Monday 2/6.
2/11/23- Tom Waits is well enough to get out of bedrest. Still wounded and flat broke, he begins job hunting about town. He gives himself 2 days, if he is still penniless he will pawn one of his single action revolvers.
2/14/23- Turnpike Kid is settling into his job at the Roadhouse. Earning his pay, keeping the peace, and he has picked up some rumors from the patrons-
A group of settlers are lost in the mountains. They should have arrived two weeks ago.
Telegraph line cut. Railroad sent out a repair team that never came back.
Chief Geronibro has escaped the reservation and crossed the border into Mexico. -
A gold nugget was found at the confluence south of Promise City -
A big herd of Bison were seen crossing the plains. The railroad is hiring hunters to keep the tracks clear.
He shares the rumors with No Horse. No Horse wants to go investigate the lost settlers.
2/15/23- Robert Lee is out of bestest. Still wounded but recovering, he is flush with cash and looking to spend.
2/15/23- Tom Waits is flat broke, so he pawns one of his single action pistols for $10, and checks in at the saloon for a drink and is still job hunting. He meets Turnpike Kid, tells him how he's down on his luck, and TPK tells him about his friend No Horse who is looking to lead a group to search for some lost settlers. He is willing to let Tom borrow his horse for the trip. TPK shares the rumors he's heard with his companions. He agrees to let Ton borrow his horse to accompany No Horse to search for the settlers. They were last seen in the mountain pass about a hundred miles north of Promise City.
2/16/23- Tom buys 2 lb bacon, lb coffee, lb beans, 2 days survival rations, a canteen and half keg of potable water. $4.90. At the fort Tom looks for Robert Lee, to see if he's healed up yet and wants to go. They ask for assistance from the fort, and are told Fort Griffin is short handed as it is, but they grant you 3 Crow Indian Scouts. Walks Among Stars, Half Yellow Face, and Two Leggings. He finds Robert who agrees to go.
2/17/23- No Horse, Tom, Robert Lee, and the 3 scouts, plus a posse that is gathered head out for the search and rescue mission.
2/19/23- So on day 3 they successfully find the trail in the mountains. The scouts and No Horse check for signs and clues of the tracks. There appears to have been a bad blizzard. Snow sits heaped high on the cliffs above the party, and any disturbance of the icy silence could set off an avalanche. Bits and pieces of baggage can be seen leading off westward. They follow the trail for a couple of miles before it gets confused. It seems to lead off every which way. As if it had been crossed and double crossed by the lost pioneers.
The snow slows their movements to 1 mile every 2 hours, or 1 hex every 4 hours. They successfully climb a bit to a high Ridgeline. In the failing light they think they can see the flicker of firelight and small wisps of smoke rising in front of the sunset. A chorus of wolf howls breaks out in the same direction. As far as baggage there were only little things unintentionally dropped and a trail of breadcrumbs that the birds were eating. They head downslope and find wolf tracks, and track them to a cave mouth, 10 pairs of eyes peering out. The wolves spring out, and 2 volleys of rifle fire take out several wolves, the rest turn tail and run. The cave is searched but nothing of note is found. Then a gunshot is heard and the party investigates, finding a messy circle of wagons with a surly looking Wild Ben Silver holding a pistol and sitting barefoot before a pot of boiled boots. Wary but wanting to help the settlers, the party tries to come up with a way to safely feed these people without causing a riot or a gunfight. (we are midway through resolving this encounter, to be continued next time.)
Session Notes- This was an interesting session in that during the previous session they had adventured ahead in time far enough that the session ended on the date of the next session. Therefore there was no downtime, the party adventured in 1:1 time ahead to the point where they consumed all the time leading up until the next session, in this case the next session date was 2/22. So there was no downtime, the previous session advanced the clock right up to the very day of the next session. So there was no need to have the last session end with rest at a safe spot, there was no downtime to worry about, this session picked up in time exactly where the last session left off. Now this just happened to work out, and had the session on the 22nd gotten canceled, then the party would have to address what to do in downtime and where to travel to get to a safe spot, but since we did play the session it meshed seamlessly. Lately we have been playing shorter but more frequent sessions, but in a few weeks we will be going back to biweekly sessions as one of our players is planning to run a Zweihander campaign on the off week. Looking forward to playing in a classic WFRP style game, and lessening the fever pace of my DMing, I've run 10 sessions of D&D in the last month, which has to be a personal record.
Treasure and XP- Monster xp- 11 men at arms- 165xp, Treasure- 6000sp, 1000ep, spear +2- 1800xp= 1965xp/ 4 PCs= 492xp each PC. Add % bonus if appropriate.
Graveyard- Larry the Caveman- died from orc crossbow bolts in the Slavers Hideout. #29
Captain Caveman- died in combat with an Aspis Drone in the Slavers Hideout #30
Nappendixia Campaign Session Report
Session #- 35 Session Date- 3/1/23 Time Passed- 1 day (3/1)
Roll Call- Boneripper- Half Orc Fighter 6
Zellmax- Gnome Thief 7
Hellenna- Human Druid 7
Thanquil- Elf Magic User 6
13 Heavy Foot Men at Arms
5 Short Bow Archers
Adventure Log- The party spends 5 days resting, spotting, and fixing up the ruined tower. On the 4th day, about 1 hour after sunrise, those spotting from the tower see a group of 5 bandit type humans sneaking and running from the dungeon entrance, once they are sure the area is clear of enemies they make a break for the clear plains to the east. The party chooses not to engage and watches them leave the area. Also during the downtime they have a discussion on the rooms in the dungeon below that have been cleared. They realize that the room with the secret doors that they kicked Darlene and her men out of would be an excellent place to make their new base of operations. They feel that after one more delve checking that area for potential enemies or encounters they would be safer using the secret door room as their base of operations and location of downtime rest. On 3/1 they gear up and reenter the dungeon, heading through the main corridor and through the right secret door back to the SE corner of the dungeon, they decide clearing that area to be of most importance. They make it safely to the secret door room, and find it to be in the same state that they left it. From there they make their way to the first door heading north from that corridor. That corridor twists around to the NE ending in a door which is searched and the lock is picked. Inside is a huge odd shaped room over 100 ft long and 70 ft wide. The room contains many pools filled with various liquids, the pools are recessed into the floor but have a 1 foot lip surrounding them. Before they can give any more attention to the pools however, a creature, man-shaped and over 7 feet tall notices them and in a rage flies towards them to attack. The creature seems supernatural as if a construct or summoned being, and it seems to be emanating some heat from its body. It charges but the party wins initiative and begins casting and preparing to receive the charge. Helenna casts barkskin on Boneripper, and Thanquil casts magic missile on the creature. The spearmen set their spears to receive the charge. The combatants crash into each other in melee, and a hidden Zellmax tries to backstab it, but is unsuccessful. Another round of spells bathes the creature in faerie fire making it easier to hit, and a final blow from Bonerippers sword slays it, as it took damage, the heat from the creature kept building. Upon its demise the creature explodes in fire bathing everyone in melee in flames. The 5 spearmen are incinerated, and Zellmax is severely burned, and Boneripper shrugs off the damage with his massive hit points. With the creature deceased they then go on to investigate the pools. Unwilling to taste or touch any, a few are probed with wooden poles, one reveals itself to be filled with acid, another seems to contain some green slimes. A few others seem drinkable, but none of the PCs are willing to try any. They instead opt to pay the spearmen to taste some of the liquids. 2 take them up on the offer and earn over 10gp trying a liquid that seems to make him feel better, and another pool tastes of fine wine. One seems to be clean potable water, and another seems to be perpetually boiling water. Thanquil casts detect magic to see which of the pools contain magic liquid. The party makes a list of all the pools and what they observe. Here it is- A - pink magical B - acid pool - key - not magical C - gas pool magical D - green slime - not magical E - drinking pool - magical F - Wine pool - magical - inviting excellent taste (wants more) G - Empty - not magical H - Boiling Pool - magical I - White aura Pool - magical J - green swirl - magical K - river water - not magical L - white smokey - magical M - normal water - gold pieces and jewels - magical N - Almost empty, little water - magical
They look throughout the room for any treasure from the creature, and despite Zellmax’s luckstone they find none. From the pool room they find a secret door which reveals another secret bedroom room. The room has a bed and other furnishings, and they find a chest containing a potion, a fine looking dagger, and some gold. There are no other exits, making this another very secure secret room. They decide to check a few of the nearby rooms they had yet to search. The 3 rooms reveal a trophy room containing a valuable statue and some tapestries, the humble quarters of a fighter, likely a guard captain to the wizard Zelligar, and a room containing stairs down to the next level. With that the entire SE corner of the dungeon has been explored. Other than the stairs heading down to the next level there are no unknowns or threats in this area. They decide to spend any future downtime in the secret rooms, and not outside in the ruined tower. A successful delve, the party made strides towards making this dungeon their own base of operations. They are hopeful that the signs of the bandits leaving means weaker denizens of the dungeon are likely fleeing either through the party’s presence, or the former presence of Darlene. Also the defeat of the Darlene and the magic columns and today’s battle with the phantom stalker means the bigger threats have been likely eliminated. Feeling safer behind the secret doors of the dungeon they elect to spend downtime here.
Session Notes- So for the last 6 weeks I have been running a lot of sessions, often 2 a week between the Nappendixia sessions I am running and the Red Frontier Campaign that I am interim DMing. Between sessions and session reports (over 50 pages of reports) I have been doing a ton of gaming. I still feel strong and am not burning out, but I need to take my foot off the gas a bit and decrease my DMing time. My Wednesday night game will be an alternating week game shared with one of my players who will be running Zweihander (in the style of classic WFRPG). I’m definitely looking forward to being a player again, especially in that system with very random char gen rules. Also, my Red Frontier sessions are coming to an end, probably one more session and then the main DM will take back over, he’s going to be running a star wars west end games d6 game for a while as a break from our fantasy campaign. So really what this is for me is a transition time where I move from intensely DMing many sessions and doing some considerable world building and planning, to getting into other games that I have not had time for these last few months. The red frontier and nappendixia campaigns both made huge strides this last 6 weeks, PCs have leveled, new areas have been developed, and new stories have been lived. My next few months of gaming I can focus more on being a player, playing new games and characters, and also getting time again for wargaming. I reconnected with an old friend who has built up a very large Mordheim group in the tri state area, he just put on a very successful tournament. I met some awesome people and was exposed to this great game. Also I have been learning and tweaking a smaller historical wargame called The Portable Wargame. It’s been fun learning that and adding a few rules to make the game work more to my liking. The Mordheim people also play fantasy RPGs and are also into crossing worlds and cross PC pollination of different worlds. I definitely want to tap into this scene and learn more about Mordheim and also the RPG campaigns being run by this crew. It was really cool to find this new resource of gamers. It’s always good to make the transition away from intense periods of gaming before you start experiencing burnout, getting behind on session reports, or feeling unprepared for upcoming sessions, and the opportunity to put free time into other games is a welcome shift.
Treasure and XP- Monster xp- phantom stalker 685, Treasure- dagger, potion, medallion, gold= 730xp 1415xp total. 4 PCs- 354xp each plus % bonus if appropriate.
Graveyard- Larry the Caveman- died from orc crossbow bolts in the Slavers Hideout. #29
Captain Caveman- died in combat with an Aspis Drone in the Slavers Hideout #30
No comments:
Post a Comment