Nappendixia Campaign 2.0- session 54

 Nappendixia Campaign Session Report

Session #-  54 Session Date-  8/2/23

Time Passed-  3 days- 8/2-8/4, Harry in bedrest from 8/4-8/9

Roll Call-  Morsov- C1

Harry- T4

Stigr- F2

Maximillion- F3

Tomas- F4

Adventure Log-  8/2-  The party heads out to the SE in search of the Papagallo old refinery location.  Early on they are tracked by a pair of hungry bears who skulk through the brush under concealment and pop out and try to eat a horse.  They wound the horse, but are peppered with arrows from the merc and party, slaying the bears and spoiling any chance of crafting a fine fur rug.  The party backtracks the bears using Stewart’s ranger skills, but after several hours of travel in the wrong direction, they turn around and resume SE.  They next approach a village of around 800, and a nearby castle to the south that seems intact and active.  Unaware of its name or existence, it is ignored and the mission at hand is finding the refinery.  That evening just before making camp they set upon a Black Obelisk atop a square but strangely architectured building.  The obelisk is 30’ tall and the black stone is veined with green tint.  It’s odd geometry is precise.  It sits on a pentagonal arrangement of flagstones and within 30’ diameter of the building all is perfect, there is no debris or decay to any part of the building or ground.  They decide to back away and camp a half hour away from the strange place.  

8/3-  the next morning they decide to enter, Morsov the cleric decides to enter first with his holy symbol humbly outstretched before him, the large bronze door is 3’ ajar, the party is mindful not to touch it or try to open it further.  Inside the room is bare, it seems different on the inside compared to the outside, there is confusion as to how.  There is a massive statue of what Morsov determines is an Elder God.  There is a 2 tier altar before the statue.   It is pitch black inside but regular torchlight lights up the room.  The statue is of a monstrous toad, furry, bat-like and sloth-like.  It is unnerving.  Harry climbs up to see what is in the upper tier of the basin.  It is filled with a pale smelly ooze, it ripples, then forms pseudopods and slams Harry.  An amorphous head and 2 arms emerge to attack.  He is nearly killed, and crashes to the floor unconscious.  Morsov is naive, and did not prepare any healing spells, but manages to stabilize Harry thanks to his stout Con.  The party grabs Harry as Morsov blocks the monster's attack but is missed.  They flee, but the gray slime creature follows them out the temple entrance.  More effective volleys of arrows from the party and mercs do damage to the monster, and a few PC melee blows finish it off.  It loses its integrity and becomes a large puddle.  With the creature dead the party moves back into search the temple, an errant healing potion is poured down Harry’s throat but he is still very weak and the entire party must search.  Strange inscriptions are found in the basin, but they are unreadable by all.  A secret compartment in the temple reveals 3 med sized coffers made of ebony.  They are secured in the wagon until Harry can study the locks.  When the coffers are taken, the statue’s eyes sparkle green.  The party takes that as their cue to exit hastily.  They mount up and travel away from the place.  That afternoon they come across another village, and a little further on a  crossroads with a few more dwellings.  Both are avoided to speed up travel.  After that, Stewart finds a large amount of tracks crossing the party’s path heading SW.  The tracks are of a large group of orcs with some carts and a line of prisoners.  The tracks seem to be about 2 weeks old.  By this time, the party moves a few more hours to the SE, makes camp rests.

8/4-  Morsov prays to the god of travel for healing, and applies 2 cure light wounds to Harry.  He is fully healed, but his near death experience will require him to get 1 week of bedrest ASAP.  Seeing how difficult it will be to try to explore the unknown without their thief, the party decides to turn around to the previous village and bed down for the night, and possibly the week if lodging for Harry can be secured.  After praying and healing, Morsov remembers the name of the bizarre elder god-  T’Saugua, clearly an evil god.  They backtrack to the village, find it to be full of curious, not so friendly people.  Morsov mentions the evil elder god and the obelisk, and the villagers shirk, they seem both fearful yet supportive of the Elder god.  The town watch almost discovers the 3 coffers in the wagon, but they remain hidden.  They discover 2 taverns- the Red Boar and The Knave’s Fingers, and settle in to pick up some rumors and information about the village.  A room in the inn is secured for Harry, and Stigr and 2 mercs room with him as guards.  Abrief survey of the village shows it has the following amenities-  a drayage warehouse, yokemaker, transport shop (seems to be losing in competition to the drayage shop, tinker, canoe maker, coal delivery, pitch maker, blacksmith, axemaker, leech/healer, and lantern maker.  The rest of the party and mercenaries camp on the outskirts of town, leery of the cultish nature of the villagers.

Session Notes-  It was the start of a vacation week for me, so things worked out really well in that we had a  guest DM join us the night before my vacation, and I got to play as a PC.  It was super fun and a great way to kick off my vacation.  That being said, I’m writing this session report a bit late after coming home, so it’s going to be on the brief side.  Sivor Khalid on Twitter ran our session.  He had been solocrawling with his small faction in a few hexes SE of Bartertown, and that was exactly where the party planned to pass through, so he agreed to run the group through his well documented hexes filled with all kinds of stuff derived from random tables.  He is an excellent DM, creative, descriptive, quick, fun, fair, really quality session. A few notes beyond getting your campaign a guest DM it’s super fun, but Sivor’s randomly rolled settlements gave the party an unexpected option.  They didn’t have to do the full 8-9 day trek out and back to  Bartertown in one session, they could stay in one of these newly found villages.  This does add complexity is that more and more obscure settlements and options for downtime stay increases the likelihood that PCs will get scattered across the map.  A good dm shouldn’t hand wave that and just allow PCs to appear in different settlements at the beginning of sessions, but well planned PCs could stay abreast of session reports and coordinate some kind of safe travel during downtime so their PC is where they need to be.   

Treasure and XP-  Monsters- 2 Black Bears 302xp, Dun Pudding 1576xp= 1878xp/ 5 PCs = 376xp each add % bonus if appropriate.  We will adjudicate the coffer treasure at the beginning of next session when Harry can assess them.

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)

Harry- Brought to Death’s Door by the Tsathoggua Temple slime monster #54 (1 week 

bedrest)

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)

The Crucible Campaign, A Patron runs a Mass Combat on Week 1

 I have been setting up and starting out as a patron in Hjeuphos’ The Crucible Campaign.  He is a really excellent patron in my game, and I figured I would offer my time as a patron in his game.  I’m playing High Mage Lith Wizard 12, and her companions Moon-Ra wizard 8, and Nofrino Fighter 8.  They are transplants via planar travel from the defunct Blackbird Campaign.  Lith and crew arrived and began assembling troops and followers and took over the empty tower and leadership of the town of Tustvold in the jungles to the west.  Nesly set up, Lith is in her tower assembling her divining coven, the Circle of Sight.  Nofrino is taking his elite H cav and 35 med cav and 40 lt cav on a large patrol around the tower and town, seeing what all is out there in the near wilderness.  The first week of patrolling, they are set upon by a massive brigand horde, over 230 strong!  They descend from the north as Nofrino scrambles to react and warn Lith.

Hjeuphos has a great system of patron and their domains, how they acquire random encounters that affect your settlement.  Without giving all the details, you roll several encounters over a month, then choose 1 that is kind of the most challenging or problematic, and you must use your resources and deal with it either in solo adjudicated combat or some other suitable way of solving the problem.  I figured rolling double 10s on # appearing for the brigands was significant, so I decided to make this my big problem for the month.  I decided to adjudicate it pretty quickly and abstractly using the Portable Wargame rules by Bob Cordery, with a few slight mods.  It went well fun, about an hour.  Plus the batrep.  The writing is a little rough but here it is.  Just a little peek behind the curtain of how patrons operate.  Didn’t think I would be self-adjudicating mass combat in my first 2 weeks of running a patron in the Crucible, but here we are. 

AAR Lith’s battle vs the Brigands (230)

The third week of July Nofrino is out on his first patrol around Lith’s new domain with his elite cav, ranger henchman and 100 cav.  They discover over 200 brigands descending on their jungle terrain from the north and scramble to interdict and call for reinforcements from the keep.

Deployment-  the Brigands are coming from the North, with their lt foot and archers on the right side of the battlefield, and the leadership/ elite cav and the med cav on the left side.  Nofrino’s troops are off the road west of the tower.

Turn 1-  Nofrino wins init and forms a line with his cav and await reinforcements while the ranger goes to the keep with word.  The brigand med cav charges the lt cav and is pushed back, the leader and elite cav charge the med cav and push it back.  The lt foot charges Nofrino’s elites, losing and taking a wound, and also the brigand mage casts lightning bolt as they charge, killing 6 brigands and 6 of Nofrino’s cav. The archers move into the swamp and the other lt foot moves into the jungle.

Turn 2-  Nofrino wins init again and Lith is told of the battle by the ranger.  The Lt cav flanks the brigands med cav and the med cav charges it also, wounding it twice.  The H. foot charge out of the tower and into the leader elite cav, and the brigands are pushed back.  Then the brigands pike and mage countercharge and the mage casts confusion, Nofrino makes his save but 11 cav fail.  The pike try to wound but are unable to wound the H foot.  Lith casts fly, and Moon-Ra casts a forked lightning bolt at the lt foot destroying them.  The archers move into the jungle.

Turn 3-  Brigands win init and the leaders elite cav goes into the flank of the med cav, wounding, while the lt cav continues to combat the brigand med cav, wounds them and routs them.  Nofrinos med cav take a wound and stay.  The brigand pike and mage go into the H Foot, but are pushed back.  The archers shoot at Lith flying in the air, and hit for 15hp.  Nofrino’s cav takes a wound from the Lt Foot, but Moon Ra casts stinking cloud on them and they are nauseated and taken out.  Lith casts Stone Trap on the retreating mage and he fails the save and is turned to stone.  

• With that the brigands are combat ineffective and their mage has been captured. the brigand leadership/elite cav, the pikes, and the archers are alllowed to retreat from the battlefield, less than 100 strong.

ok got lucky with treasure, even with half shares, i got 500gp off the bodies, 2000gp, 1000pp, 4 gems 500gp each, and a rod of cancellation.

after the battle, Nofrino's losses are 6 dead elite cav, and 10 dead med cav.

Here’s the Campaign Map, Lith’s domain is the purple border, the battle happened right by the tower and town.

Nappendixia Campaign 2.0- session 52

 Nappendixia Campaign Session Report

Session #-  52 Session Date-  7/19/23

Time Passed-  1 day, 7/19, return to Bartertown via air that evening.  Rest 7/20, Bart, Max,and Mook training 7/21-7/27.

Roll Call- Harry- T4

Bart- C1

Godhard- C4

Maximilion- F2

Tomas- F3

Mook- T1

Adventure Log-  After spending several days of downtime in the Kenku lair, the party is a little stir crazy and ready to do some more exploring.  They manage to get a little more information out of the human that hangs around with the kenku, and he tells them a little more about the interior of the dungeon, how to go up a level to access the gorilla men and the manling keep above that, and an access down to the next lower level.  A few of the party, upon closely observing the human, realize that it isn’t actually a human, but rather a kenku in an incredibly clever disguise.

7/19-  The party checks out the green area of the dungeon, seeing if it could possibly be secured as a permanent downtime location.  They then open up and enter the orange area, returning to the room they fought the stunjelly in.  It remains empty after the combat, and they proceed to a corridor and chamber to the south, with Harry searching and poking ahead with the 10’ pole.  In the chamber his pole prods a trigger and while examining the floor a swinging blade trap releases from the ceiling.  With a split second to react he backflips out of the way, and the party marks the trigger spot and resets the trap as a potential ambush should they be pursued.  They return north and begin exploring a corridor heading west, entering a darkened chamber.  As it is illuminated and the 10’ pole prodded inside, a tile mosaic of an open eye and eyelid on the floor, the party is unsure if it changed or reacted in some way when they entered.  The room is otherwise empty and the west corridor continues.  They begin hearing the sound of mechanical movement, possibly the rolling of something on tracks or spinning wheels.  Cautiously investigating to the west, an open door rimmed with orange tiles opens into a large chamber with a high vaulted ceiling.  At the north wall sits a semicircular dais,  upon which is an eerie statue of a man whose skin is peeling off revealing a vaguely anthropomorphic creature with a central eye in its head/neck/thorax area.  Around the statue, high up in the vaulted ceiling are many metal tracks that extend out of small holes in the walls and circle around the statue in intricate pathways.  Along the tracks roll grapefruit sized spheres of various materials, clicking and sliding in and out of the walls along the tracks.  The whole mechanism has a polyrhythmic sound and they come to a crescendo of moving spheres when before the statue a portal of blackness opens up obscuring it.  Emerging from the blackness of the portal is a creature of pure nightmare- a horrific mass of gore and bones held together by linen wraps. The clerics suspect it may be smited with divine power, but again the power of turning is thwarted by the chaos of the Eyeless Void.  Next several combatants attack it with mundane missile and melee weapons, only to either miss completely or see them pass harmlessly through the creature's mass.  Only after Godhard smites it with his magic hammer, and Mook unleashes his magic giant eagle does the foul creature fall.  Upon its death a pile of 2000ep forms at the base of the statue as the last of the spheres run their course on the tracks and the machine sits idle.  The party decides to take the treasure, and the mechanism engages again and the spheres begin releasing from the walls and rolling on the tracks, reaching the zenith the portal opens again and out comes a molten hot worm about 5’ long 2’ wide made of hot moving rock.  The party chooses to cautiously run from such a bizarre creature fleeing back down the corridor past the room with the eye mural, then resetting and spying down the hall to see if they are pursued.  Max at the rear is able to see the rockworm crawl out of the chamber and actually turn and head away from the party further down the corridor.  Curious, they move back towards and into the mechanical chamber, once again they hear the movement of the spheres and enter and the portal again opens.  This time a jelly comes undulating out of the portal, groping at the party with pseudopods.  Several slices from Tomas halberd along with other combat strikes take down the jelly, while the giant eagle is instructed to fly up and snatch a sphere from a track.  It manages to grab 2, and after the jelly dies, the machine makes a clicking noise up to this point unheard, as if the machine is stuck or trying to engage.  In moments the portal opens again, this time 3 wererats leap out and attack with wicked shortswords.  Bart takes several slices, but the rats are handled fairly quickly, while Mook has the eagle return the 2 spheres, 1 of copper and 1 of sandstone back on the tracks and they roll into the walls and the clicking ends and the portal closes.  A glint of magical energy appears at the base of the statue but no treasure appears.  Relieved, they move on.  Beyond the machine room the corridor only goes 20 more feet and ends at a door rimmed in orange tile; they use the orange key to enter, despite a 2’ diameter hole bored through the door to the other side.  Beyond, no more colored tiles rim the floors or doors.  They head NW to a raw, unfinished chamber, no tile floors have been laid and the walls are roughly carved rock.  The hot floor marks the impression where the molten worm has crawled, and in this room is a second rockworm, apparently it has lived here for a while as the walls and floors of this area are littered with swiss cheese like holes boring in and out in all directions.  Bart, undaunted by the second worm, quaffs a potion of fire resistance, hoping to grapple it to submission.  He misjudges 2 things- the fact that it reacts by coiling back and launching at him fast and hard into the chest, and the fact that it is made of very heavy rock and therefore difficult to grapple.  While it is tied up with Bart however, Godhard manages to conjure a considerable amount of water directly above the worm and douse it in a gout of cold water.  It is largely extinguished and killed after a few firm blows.  The second one is quickly pounced upon and dealt with before it can back out of its tunnel and attack.  The party finds a few places in the creatures bodies where the heat and pressure conditions were right for forming gemstones, and 8 crude gemstones are pried from the creatures limp bodies.  Battered and exhausted, they creep back to the Kenku lair and rest a bit, then negotiate a fee to pay for aerial passage all the way back to Bartertown.  The kenku are eager to get rid of their guests, and happily fly them all back for 1000gp, with Mook flying on his mechanical giant eagle.  They return them to Bartertown, and reveal a bit more about the megadungeon, that a 3rd exterior cave entrance does exist, it is on the south side and obscured by some rock formations, but it is there.  Several of the party begin training on 7/21 after a day of rest.

Session Notes-  I had this issue come up a few times this week, so I’ll include it here in session notes-  My overall Dm philosophy is keep it loose until it needs to be tight.  What I mean is that I do have an idea where things are going when I drop a hint or give an adventure hook or rumor, but I don’t overthink it or have it fully planned out.  It would be a huge waste of time to not drop hooks on players until they are 100% fleshed out, just dangle the basic idea out there and if it’s ignored/ given limited interest, that’s all the development you need, you haven’t wasted any time.  I wait until players prod with a thing and give it great interest, then I scramble  to develop into the complete thing it needs to be to be run in session.  The scramble part may seem unpleasant, but actually the player interaction feeds your creativity and gives you more to work with and frames exactly what you need to flesh out and what is ephemera.  This happened with the machine sphere device in this session, the last time I had PCs interact with this device they just saw it as a spinny magic device that produces monsters to fight, and left it at that.  That’s all it was until this new crop of players started prodding at it, how does it work, what happens if I pick up a sphere, what triggers it?  This new crop of players had all these questions and wanted to mess with the device a lot.  So I had to improvise in session, and use my creativity to react to the players. After the session when they continued to ask questions about it in downtime, I then had to take the time to figure out exactly how this device would work, probably like an hour of thinking, remembering and getting inspired.  It was time well spent because my plans and response will create both more downtime discussion, and also more interaction as they will surely at some point want to use their new information to further investigate the machine.  It’s all kind of a circular process.  At the end I’m quite happy as a reactive type dm I feel my time in between sessions is never wasted.

Treasure and XP-  Monsters- Blade trap 300xp, Huecava 891xp, Ochre Jelly 246xp, Wererats 774xp, Thoqqua 193xp.  Treasure- 2000ep(1000xp), 8 gems 80gp/xp= 3484xp/ 6 PCs= 581xp each, add % 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)

Nappendixia Campaign 2.0- session 51

 Nappendixia Campaign Session Report

Session #- 51 Session Date- 7/12/23

Time Passed- 5 Days (7/12-7/16), light duty 7/17.

Roll Call-  Mook- T1

Harry- T4

Maximillion- F2

Godhard- C4

2 Med Cav

Bart- C1

1 Sgt 

Tomas- F4

1 Med Cav

Adventure Log-    7/12- Several PCs are finishing up training this day, so there is some gathering of supplies, purchasing of horses, and plans laid to head out tomorrow in search of adventure.  The party discusses heading SE to the ruined keep scouted by Jack, it seems there is a band of creatures and a fighter with a magic sword challenging travelers and kidnapping them.  They also wish to return to the megadungeon to the west, but Tomas also checks in with Papagallo to get more info on his plan to move out of Bartertown with his people.  He tells Tomas he needs explorers to scout the SE for him; he seeks a ruined compound with some strange metal devices.  If found it will greatly help him in his plan to move.  They decide to head to the megadungeon, thinking that maybe they can scout a place either inside or outside of the dungeon to make into a semi-permanent camp.  During the day a group of 14 hungover ogres, fans of the East Orange Ogres, shows up expecting the game to be happening today.  They are furious to hear it has already happened, and even more furious to hear the ogres lost!  They are about to riot in the city, but some quick thinking city watch goes to the blood bowl pitch and gets some ogre players to calm things down.

7/13-  The party heads out on the 3 day journey to the megadungeon, slowed by their heavier warhorses as several folks have upgraded their mounts.  They go slower, but can now charge mounted in combat.  However it now takes 3 days to get to the megadungeon instead of 2.  The day of travel west reveals a crack in the badlands, a shallow cave.  There are signs of combat between a few humans and some kind of creature.  An errant boot and some broken arrows, some blood, danderish fur/feather matter and a black blood not human.  Godhard casts light into the hole and Max climbs in, ready for a fight, but interested in any errant treasure too.  Nothing but some feathers are found, Tomas finds one nice enough for his cap.  

7/14-  Another day of mostly uneventful travel, Godhard spots a palm sized reptilian scale on the open plains and has his cav retrieve it.  That evening Bart and Max spy some red eyes from a distant bush peering for a few seconds then disappearing.  They are extra watchful, but nothing else occurs.

7/15-  The party arrives at the scene of the megadungeon at dusk.  They do some observing and see the same scene of chaos and fighting between the Gorilla men, reinforced from the south, and the little manlings, reinforced from the north.  The top of the flat mountain has a massive rectangular stone structure atop it.  It is about 2 stories high and covers the whole mountaintop.  At the north end of the structure there is a ruined keep occupied by the manlings.  The gorilla men have a stables and small wood fort and clearly have some kind of stair access into the stone structure.  As night falls the combats die down, and the party makes a break for a rocky outcropping to the east, hoping to sneak north and make an alliance with the manlings.  They make it to the outcropping, but upon looking at the eastern cliffside and the cave mouth high up, they see first one, then 2 medium sized bird creatures wing down into the cave mouth and land inside.  This alters their plan as Harry strips down to Tunnel Rat Gear Loadout, and makes a deft sneak across open ground to the cliffside.  He then scrambles up the lower half of the cliff, fixes a rope, ties the other end around his waist and makes a push for the cave mouth.  He makes it and secures the rope to the cave floor.  Just as he is able to peer down the corridor and start footpadding, he bumps squarely into the 2 bird men, backing up, a 3rd attempts to pickpocket the fireworks off of Harry’s belt meant for an emergency signal.  Harry allows the pickpocket despite interrupting it.  He is unable to communicate with them, they seem to regard each other with looks and gestures.  Finally a human emerges from a corridor and speaks with Harry, explaining they can offer them passage into the megadungeon and they can guide them to certain levels and answer certain questions, but it will be at a price.  There were outsider humans they dealt with before and it was a lot of work dealing with them, so they are leery.  They offer to fly the party up into the cliffside for 100gp each, offer them safe lodging and help them navigate the dungeon.  However, they have a small interplanar infestation caused partly by the prior humans, and they need the party to handle that as a sign of good faith that they can work together.  The rest of the party is flown up and things are discussed.  The party agrees to rest the night and go into what the human calls the green portion and orange portion of their level.  

7/16-  After sleeping in a secure room in the birdmen (kenku) area, the party are give an orange key and told to proceed through the green area to the locked orange door and enter.  In the orange area is where the planar disturbance is.  They tell them to beware of traps in the green area.  They are led through a secret door into the green area.  As soon as the party enters someone steps on a pressure plate and triggers a portcullis to fall, blocking access to the secret door out.  The strong members of the party try to lift the gate and get it a foot up but then get it crooked in the track, jamming it.  They try to right it but it will take time.  They proceed through this room into a corridor that turns right with a door on the left.  Harry checks the door for traps and is unsuccessful and bathed in a gout of flame from the door's keyhole.  He’s seriously wounded and backs away as the door opens, revealing a small mostly empty room with a bowl depression in the stone floor, some magical looking fire filling it.  3 orange/red 3 foot long snakes slither from the fire and approach.  Max quickly slams the door as Godhard heals Harry.  He then casts create water and has it all flow under the shut door, dousing the inside of the room.  The door is opened revealing 3 sizzling snakes rendered extinguished by the water.  The fire remains, boiling the water as it pools into the depression.  Mook notices a gem in the depression and attaches a spoon to the end of his 10’ pole and fishes it out, a decent haul for one gem.  They move down the hall, looking for the orange door, and find it and open it with the orange key.  It opens into another small room that seems empty but when Harry goes to investigate the north wall it reaches out to strike him with a  pseudopod. He is smacked by its slimy paw, but resists its paralyzing poison.  Bart steps in and pushes Harry back, exposing himself to attack and is struck, also resisting the poison.  An onslaught of weapon strikes, ending with a dart puncture from Mook bursts the slimy stunjelly, a cousin to the gelatinous cube to protoplasm an inch thick on the floor.  The recessed wall where the creature was hidden reveals the slimed over bones and surviving magic items from its prior victims.  They find a hammer, 2 potions, a jar of dust, a ring, and a fancy necklace amongst the bones.  They also find a small metal owl, when they get the slime off it and check it out it looks like this- the haul is packed up and the slightly injured party decides to head back to the kenku area to recover and check out their loot, perhaps get some more info from the human that hangs out with the kenku.  They rest for several days and check out their new items.

Session Notes-  Some serendipitous die rolls have shown lately that you can get some amazing ideas and situations strictly from letting your games flow from the random tables in the DMG.  One funny moment at the beginning of the session is Tomas casually stated he would like to buy a few med cav.  I informed him he had to roll on the table on pg. 30 to represent searching on downtime for merc, not everything is immediately available.  So on the first roll he gets med cav and just casually purchases exactly the troop type he wanted.  Not an easy roll to make.  Another thing I have been doing is throwing some mundane encounters into the mix.  If every time you give details and descriptions about a situation and that always leads to a combat encounter, it kind of telegraphs to the players when a combat is upcoming.  By introducing descriptive details that actually have no substance and go nowhere makes the players react differently.  This group is starting to get that, I think it’s happened enough times that they realize not every descriptive moment from the DM is going to lead to a combat encounter.  I throw out those random descriptions a few times a session and it colors the world better. It shows that in your epic travels and adventures, sometimes you just get your boot stuck in mud, or sometimes a creepy empty cave is just that, a creepy EMPTY cave.  It affects players time management, and also affects how much loot heavy encounters they can get to in a session. I also have a separate encounters table of my own design that incorporates a lot of non-combat encounters, and it also is there to represent smaller encounters with fewer numbers appearing.  Like orcs can’t possibly only walk around in groups of 20-200.  That’s not feasible, clearly there are groups of 5 or 10 or fewer groups of orcs that can be encountered.  My home encounters table accounts for this.  I also have lots of non combat encounters like weather events, terrain features, signs of destruction/old combats, and monster tracks or signs, but not the actual monster.  I think this combo of using the main dmg table plus a few of my own to broaden the scope of encounters available is working to make a more realistic world.  Finally I want to talk about downtime.  A lot is happening in downtime, way too much to catalog in session reports.  I was trying to keep some downtime things in the loop in session reports, but I’m still trying to find a way to keep these reports shorter.  So I’ll basically not be mentioning much that happens in downtime, readers can always contact me and get access to the Discord and read the downtime logs yourself.  Players are doing a lot of info gathering about adventure locations, getting more details on the settlement they are living in, investigating magic items, making purchases, planning out the next session.  This only works when you have good players who are invested in this type of play, so I applaud my players for really enhancing this campaign.  

Treasure and XP-  Monsters- Stunjelly 221xp, 3 Fire Snakes 273, Traps 400= 894xp.  Treasure and Magic- 1000gp necklace, 500gp gem, hammer, 2 potion, ring, dust, owl= 6000xp Total= 6894xp /6 PCs= 1149xp each.  Add % 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)