Nappendixia Campaign 2.0- session 53

 Nappendixia Campaign Session Report

Session #- 53 Session Date- 7/26/23

Time Passed- 7 days- 7/26-8/1 Mook and Bart training 8/2-8/9

Roll Call- Mook- T2

Bart- C2

Maximillion- F3

Godhard- C4

Tomas- F3

10 Med Cav

Adventure Log-  7/26 The party orders 2 custom made battlewagons from the earnings of the recent sale of the magic Dex book. Tomas was able to get 25,000gp for it from Auntie, a very fair price considering the lack of available coin in Bartertown.  He was also able to negotiate 2 important pieces of information, the direction and possible location of Papagallo’s site, and The location of the killer of his family, Resheph of the Snake Cult.  Stigr begins training to be the battlewagon ballista gunner.  Several of the party complete training and a plan is made to travel SE in an attempt to find the site Papagallo is looking for.  The battlewagons will be ready in one week, so they plan to do a 1 week trip out and back as a preliminary scouting mission.  

7/27 The travel SE goes mostly uneventful. Cooler weather allows the wearing of metal armor unimpeded.  An hour before dusk, the party comes upon the ruined keep reported by Jack the Ranger.  They spy it from a nearby copse of trees, and watch a small group of med sized monstrous humanoids emerge and lay an ambush at the side of the road.  Cautious and dubious, they decide to back away and not sleep near the keep.  As they watch, a wolf approaches them within 40 feet, regards them, then takes off towards the keep.  Wary, Mook tries to set a snare trap for whatever may try to return for them, but is unsuccessful and the party camps elsewhere.  

7/28 Second day of SE travel, midday a strong wind picks up and disturbs a clutch of Bloodhawks nesting in a joshua tree, they angrily attack the party.  They are quick, with razor sharp beaks and talons, they draw blood several times on the PCs but are slowly whittled down through weight of melee blows and are put down.  Their nest is searched and 3 gems valuing 1150gp are found.  Several med cav are wounded, but none fall.

7/29  The party travels SE a third day, only to realize at noon that they are lost, they spend several hours orienting themselves by using their goggles and finding some high ground to find the course SE.  They get back on course and realize they are at their turnaround point that night.  They make one last scout east, seeing if they can locate the best direction to find the Papagallo site.  They look northeast and see the distant beginning of forest terrain, and know the site is not near trees.  East and southeast look more promising, as the terrain stays scrub/badlands in those directions.  They mark this point on their map and decide to return back here after the battlewagons are ready.  Hopefully one more exploration will reveal the location of the site.  

7/30 The group begins the return trip NW back to Bartertown, they may have heard whispering voices in the night, but nothing disturbs them.

7/31  Taking a slightly different tack so as to avoid the upcoming ruined keep and the evil fighter, they come upon a ruin they did not pass on the way out.  It is a ruined manor house, and upon approaching 3 disgusting creatures emerge from the ruined portal.  They shamble forward stupidly to attack.  The cav charges through them and a lance strikes true to each creature.  However, in each case, the lance, after striking, becomes adhered to the body of the gross slimy creatures who smell of sour glue.  Max charges forward and strikes with his spear, then in the next round his sword, both of which stick to the creature and are wrenched from his hands.  While that is happening several more weapons become stuck to the creatures.  Just as several are calling out to back up and engage with missile fire, both Max and Godhard are struck by the creatures slimy paws, and are adhered to their fists, held aloft as human shields.  Missile fire is no longer an option, so Bart grabs one of the lances and drives it hard into the ground, spiking the creature to the ground with Max on top of it.  It along with the others are pummelled down, then realize that even in death, things adhere to the creatures.  They try wine, and oil, but only fire seems to work and they carefully free the weapons and humans with the hot coals of a stubbed out torch.  Inside a hidden hollow in the ruined house, they find 2 scrolls and 2 potions.  They continue on home towards Bartertown.  That evening they encounter the same group of nomadic merchants they bumped into weeks ago on the other side of Bartertown.  They welcome each other to camp for the night, and ask the merchants about the Papagallo site, even showing the etching image of the location.  They recognize it and give them good directions to find the area it is situated in.  The 2 parties depart in the morning.

8/1  After a half day of travel, the party spies and hails a Bartertown patrol and rides back to town with them.  They are eager to pick up their newly completed battlewagons, resupply and return to find Papagallo’s site.

Session Notes-  This was a particularly exciting session for me because I got to see the results of some downtime behind the scenes negotiations that I had nothing to do with.  Tomas the fighter asked the party if he could negotiate with auntie for the sale of the magic Dex book.  I gave Hjeuphos, the Bartertown patron, some background info and some bits of information he could use in the negotiations, and the 2 players worked it out in private message, and Tomas then reported the story back to the party (and me) during this session.  It was just a really cool experience being the DM of a game but still getting to experience the mystery of revealing what players are doing behind the scenes.  It was a pretty cool experience, and definitely adds another layer of depth to the game.  An interesting part of that negotiations/information exchange was that it involved another patron, but one who has since dropped out.  My experience with patrons is that most lose interest over time much faster than players drop off.  It obviously has to have a lot to do with how nebulous the concept of patron really is, everyone has a different take on what it should be and everyone has a different area of interest in what they like to do with their patrons.  Nonetheless, Tomas had built a story that involved this patron, and evil snake cult raider guy, killing his family and Tomas seeking him out for revenge.  Even though the patron has lost touch, I still have all the details he gave me and things he developed, and this was/is still enough to complete any story Tomas wants to teas out of the patron, the backstory and resources have already been created and are documented in his patron channel, it’s like another campaign resource that was built up organically by mostly another person, thus saving me work and increasing the level of creativity in the game.  Very pleased.  

The final session note for the week is the party used planned time exploration for the first time this session.  It’s a concept that players eventually stumble upon as they get more comfortable with 1:1 time and start to play with it more intelligently.  The had put in the big order for their battlewagons, and knew they would be ready in 1 week, but also wanted to do the scouting mission for Papagallo, but were aware of the possibility of that trip taking them more than a week to complete, thus making them unavailable for next session.  So they planned a prelim scouting trip with a planned turnaround time- 3 days out and 3 days back, guaranteeing they would be home in time to pick up the battlewagons, rest and resupply, then likely head out for the bigger trip of actually finding the site which could take longer than a week.  They had a real in-game need to play in a time sensitive way, and the scouting trip benefitted them as they picked up new clues to the location of the site.  Just another example of elite level play.

Treasure and XP-  Monsters- 11 Blood Hawks 374xp, 3 Adherer 726, Treasure- 3 gems 1150gp/xp, potion extra healing 400xp, potion gaseous form 300xp, scroll- airy water, push, identify, write, dispel magic 1100xp, scroll- divination, slow poison, spiritual hammer 1000xp= 3900xp/ 5 PCs = 780xp each add 10% bonus if appropriate.

Graveyard- Rollo Tomassi-  consumed by a Bag of Devouring in Zelligar’s dungeon  #38

Ragenard- brought to Death’s Door by a stirge attack in Zelligar’s dungeon #39 (1 week bed rest)

Caolite- brought to Death’s Door by kobolds in Zelligar’s dungeon #40 (1 week bedrest)

Bart-  brought to Death’s Door by Firetoad breath in Zelligar’s dungeon #40 (1 week

bedrest)

Ragenard-  killed by Griffons exploring the plains west of Fort Turjmir #42

Vlana-  killed by Troglodytes in the 2nd level of Zelligar’s dungeon #43

Stigr’s 4 Lt. Foot- killed by Zombies on the plains of Lancebrass #45

 

Godhard’s 2 Med Cav- killed by Firenewt’s mounted on Giant Striders #47

Stig- brought to Death’s Door by Orc raiders at the walls of Bartertown #48 (1 week     bedrest)