Tuesday, July 3, 2018

D&D Post game 6-23-18 part 1



Silver Town, just after the battle against the demon infested townsfolk……

Reginald,  (the ½ orc barbarian), Jeffery, (the dragonborn rouge), Ren (the human monk ) and Lukas Fudderer ( human archeologist-/ split level mage-cleric) are discussing options when they see three other figures walking into town. Hands go to weapons as the three approach the four.
 
As they get closer the trio can see their musical elf friend Varis (bard) and a onetime associate Garik and another ½ orc (fighter). The third figure is dressed in fairly clean and shiny scale mail and carrying a shield. This armored human has an air of purity and nobility around him (paladin). The two parties uneasily greet each other.


There have been doppelganger issues in the past so….. the monk, rouge and barbarian are a bit skeptical. However, after a few minutes of conversation (and a bit of scrying) they know they can trust Varis, Garik and take their word that this human paladin Septimus is a standup guy.

Then the discussion began as to what to do next. The paladin, bard and fighter were hired to come to Silver Town to kill a demon in priest clothing. However, that was already accomplished. Then there was the mine where some creature was living and terrorizing the town. There was also the trek into the wastelands to find the warlock lair that Lukas was looking for. They decided to investigate the mine first since they were here.





The Mine
Twilight was approaching as the party arrived at the remains of the small mining camp. The mine entrance was boarded shut. The trio of buildings outside the mine had fallen on hard times. They looked to be a small office, storage and a third that was possibly a flophouse. Time, weather and obviously needing boards to close the mine; had turned the buildings into ruins and rubble. The party split and searched around the outside of the mine. They found no tracks, other entrances or signs of anything. The decided to remove the boards and enter the mine.


Down, down, down they walked into the defunct silver mine. After hundreds and hundreds of feet they found nothing. No tracks. No monsters. No silver. All they found were tracks, mine carts, old lanterns, signs of mining and bits of forgotten gear. The only noticeable bit was that the air was being drawn into the mine. They continued to follow the cart tracks.

Then the tracks suddenly stopped. Sure the wooden ties were still there, but the rails and spikes to hold the rails were just gone. They also found what looked like the wooden pieces for a mine cart, but the metal was gone. Lukas crouched down and grabbed what looked like a handful of brown dirt. He ran it through his fingers and smelled it.

“Damn. Iron oxide.” he says as he lets the material fall through his fingers and back to the ground. He looks to the party. “Only something like a rust monster could and would do this to these tracks. Plus it could explain the loss of silver in the mine. If it got into the silver veins, then it would have on Hell of a snack. Still they don’t normally attack and cause physical harm to anyone. Well unless really provoked. It is doubtful a rust monster was terrorizing the town.”

The party swaps to ranged weapons, stows their valuables, places the paladin at the rear of the group and moves deeper into the mine. After a few hundred feet they turned a corner and saw the rear of a strange propeller tail armored creature. Well they had found the rust monster. Arrows and crossbow bolts flew…..and punched through the creatures’ armored shell. It promptly sat there. A second volley and still no movement. The group approached and found that the majority of the rust monster was gone. The shell was empty and looked to have been “scooped out.” It appears something got the rust monster first.  The party moved onward.






Soon the mine tunnel ended in a giant opening in the wall. It looked as if the miners hit a large chamber underground and this is where the eldritch creature attacking the town may have come from. They entered this large natural cavern and began to explore. They first noticed the sheer size of this place. Even with torches and infravision they could not see the opposite walls or ceiling of this chamber. That would soon prove troublesome for the group.



As they walked through the dark room the rouge and fighter were suddenly wrapped up in spined tentacles from the darkness above! The group sprang to action attacking the tentacles and trying to see what they were attached too. They soon discovered that as a pair of what appeared to be giant floating brains with beaks descending down on the party. Steel met beak and tentacle in combat. The fighter and rouge managed to escape the grasping spined tentacles of the grell attacking them. Not only that, but they managed to avoided the paralytic venom from the spines as well. The barbarian landed a vicious blow that would have removed the head of a grell….if it had an actual head. Instead he drove his two handed blade deep into the brain-like tissue of its body and then with a twist and reverse slash, removed the blade. The grell died and slowly descended to the floor hitting it with a syrupy thud. The second grell was put down by the monk, rouge and bard with a combination of gunpowder, fists and daggers. The fighter and paladin tried to help, but there was little for them to do before the grells were finished.











The party continued down into the cavern to see if these were the creatures attacking Silver Town or maybe it was something else (spoiler...the grell were attacking the town. they were able to remove the boards from the mine entrance and didn't leave any tracks either). Soon a few people heard what sounded like chirping. Like really large crickets, but very intermittent and not as constant as crickets. It was a matter of moments later when they discovered what was making the sound, a trio of hook horrors rushing through the cavern toward them. Once again the party sprung to action to battle the chitinous hook beasts.
As they fought off these three creatures back they heard what sounded like more of the creatures coming. Three more of these beasts rushed the party. Driven by the sound of first battle and the scent of dead grell have driven them into a feeding frenzy behavior. Sadly for them, it was not enough. The party quickly dispatched the six hook beasts with little effort (yeah a horrid rolling for these guys from me made for a really weak sauce encounter that could/should have been a lot lot tougher).



With the hook horrors dead the party discussed what to do next. Lukas had hired them to find the lair of Ariahiri Didani, the warlock. The party voted and they decided to stop this venture into the depths of the Earth. It seems like they had possibly found a second entrance (the first in the depths of the Forge of Durgeddin adventure) to the world of the Underdark, or just a really deep cave. Either way, they made note of the location of this possible series of Underdark caves. The monk was very interested in continuing on, but was talked into coming back another time. He has real axe to grind against the underground dark elves. The group made their way back to the mine entrance and then to Silver Town. There they stopped to rest for the night. Lukas had told them they needed another three to four days travel into the wastes to find the lair of the warlock.







HEY follow or go check out @Regthebarbarian for live tweets from this game!

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