Lost Crown of Neverwinter - D&D Encounter #2

The evening started off when I heard a couple of the other dm's discussing short rests.  I told them about the skill challenge I had written and both were interested in trying it out.  Then after looking again at the Neverwinter Campaign Guide, I'm still debating with myself if I want to buy it or not. We head down stairs and got set up.

I made a few announcements including the upcoming Lair Assault, and Isles of Rot continuing this coming September.    It will be interesting to see how both of those combined with the school year effect  attendance at Encounters.

Tonight my table was missing a fighter and had gained a Bladesinger, otherwise it was the same group of players. 

Opening positions were based on where
people ended last session.

The bladesinger opted out of the skill challenge and called the dragons attention to her.  It gave the group their first success and her the dragons attention.  Another party member threw a stone at and tried to shout it down (he failed his intimidation roll) The groups thief Locke tried a different tactic and attempted to bluff the Dragon into believing a Gold Dragon, this also failed.  

At this the group was on the verge of failing the skill challenge.  The next 3 checks however were successful and they ended the challenge with a win.  An insight check gave them an idea of where the dragon was going next. And the clever use of Mage Hand distracted it with a lit sun rod. 

The Heir then did his thing with the dragon.  Sadly the battle of wills was short lived when the players took the opportunity to pile on some opening damage. Afterwards thanks to a poor initiative the Dragon's beat down continued.

The heir charged in shouting a valiant battle cry to the effect of "Never in my city!" Our new bladesinger rushed in as well and hit. Not keen on fighting 2 blades, the dragon turned and trampled over several party members.  The beasts claws dug deep into flesh as it moved.

Two dwarves both War priests were caught in the dragons trample.  Only 1 was able to still strike it.  Then the Drow Hunter who had taken a pounding the week before, this was able to stay at range and stay out of the dragons reach.  He was able to hit it consistently through out the combat.

Then it was time for some revenge on the part of the Dragon.  Most of the group was clumped together nicely, including the heir.  I described the breath weapon as looking like super hot blue flames. Then the players were surprised when it dished out the cold damage.  I rolled the damage and was grateful for some decent rolls.  The players look crushed when they heard the numbers.  Then I described the crown drawing in the energy of the blast and they were all very grateful for half damage.

As a DM I just wish we had a theifling in the party, that wood have made the surprise perfect.   In hopes of finishing off one of the dwarfs it double clawed as it was still smoldering.

The rest of the encounter was pretty much a slow-motion blur.  Most of the pc's had a hard time shaking of that effect.  One was stuck slowly rushing to heal the bladesinger. He'd used up his healing words already and had to give her a portion of healing he carried.  Besides of that the highlights include the dragon's trample attack that kept the players hoping and did account for a decent amount of damage and some repetitive hack & slash.  

The final moments of the combat could have flowed together better if I had hand scripted them.  A massive trample attack from the dragon knocked down several party members and the heir.  It even killed one of them.  This final attack was enough to bloody the heir.  It ended it's trample snarling at the halfling who stood two squares away.  The little halfling twirled his sling about and moved to a better position and let fly.  The stone hit him for the finishing blow.  All of that happened at the same time as the Heir was standing back up and starting his magic and turned the Dragon to stone. After the battle there was a brief exchange between the players in which the heir where he rewarded them and thanked them for their assistance. Then he left disappearing into the city.

I wanted to comment on one of our other tables as well. We have one table of really young (around 12ish) players.  They all came in as a group and like to play together.  A few of them were at my table for Gates of Neverdeath.  They didn't do all that well in the encounter. Out of a table of 6 only 2 survived and they had less then 10HP each.  What is really important about the table is how it ended. In the end the players who had died were still around the table.  They were excited for the survivors and cheering them on. It was great to see them that into the game and what was happening.

I was excited for this encounter and thought it would be a lot of fun. In the end I felt it was a bit of a let down.  Fighting a dragon is a great way to kick a campaign off, but you need to be invested in your characters to make it a real threat. The players, with the exception of those who played Gates of Neverdeath, were to new to the characters and had no real attachment to them.  I also felt that they needed more of a reason to be there and more importantly to stay an fight. I over heard the player of Locke comment about running away.

Well that sums up this week for me. Sorry for the lack of photos this week, I had a couple of others but no matter what I did with them Blogger kept turning them upside down.  Anyways I am off to work on a new Shadow Run Campaign now so later.

Lost Crown of Neverwinter - D&D Encounter #1

I got my materials about a week ago and have been really looking forward to season.  The story looks like it will be an interesting one to tell with the PCs.  It also looks like it will be a challenging one for the players as well.  So pitting those two things together and it will be a great season.

Things started off a little rocky two of my regular players texted me and let me know that they wouldn't be able to make it.  Hopefully they will both be back next week.  I end up with 1 of my long time players, 3 regular encounter players who just normally play at a different table, and one player who was an experienced gamer who is still new to 4E.  This was his second encounter session.

None of the players had a copy of the Neverwinter campaign setting so I quickly read of the description of the background themes.  Three of the five players grabbed a theme and two didn't bother.  I think in the long term they will be kicking themselves for that decision.

I laid out the map and set up a few 3D paper fold items I have to set the scene.  Rather then clutter up the board with a ton of extra townsfolk minis I used the PC tokens for them.  I also used minion token for the shop owners. Then we rolled initiative to give everyone an order to act in.

With the theme I really stressed the newness of the area of town they were in.  As well as the disrepair of everywhere else.  I also stressed the marketplace as being both a market and a place to escape the hard that everyone was doing as part of the effort to rebuild the town.

The characters went around and did a bit of shopping.  Those who had played through the Gates of Neverdeath had gold burning a hole in their pouches.  A couple of the players worked hard to help repair the supply cart, and never asked for anything in return.  Another character paid double for a portion of healing.  This is a dangerous city after all, and the merchant liked to keep them for himself.  

Our Heir of Delzoun meeting the armour, who it turned out was also an heir of Delzoun, and shared a bit of information.  Then offered to spend some time working with him and help him with his stall.  It was a great exchange and a new friendship born.  I hope the player remembers it and it comes back up in the game later.

My favorite role-playing encounter came when the Drow Hunter went and spoke with the half-Orc weapon merchant.  He wanted a new bow and got all offended when Nagda suggested that he check with the toy vendor down the pier and that she only dealt in true weapons, not children's toys.  By the end of the roleplaying portion of the evening everyone had at least one interesting exchange or two.

After about an hour or so I could see that some of the players were starting to slow down and it was time to move on.  I read out the next section of flavor text and deployed the minis.  The new 4E player was ready to cut and run when he saw the number of them.  Then another player explained the concept of minions.  I of course refused to admit if there were any minions on the field.  Encouraging them instead to man up and attack to find out.

The combat moved swiftly Locke the halfling thief hid in the fountain and used his sling to great effect.  The plaguechanged skeletons rushed and attacked pc's, that were in reach, and towns folk when they couldn't. A couple of towns folk dropped and some minor damage was done to the PCs.

The players fought back ignoring the downed townsfolk.  In using the PC tokens I was able to just flip them over to bloodied.  Clorde jumped into his cart drove away. However because of the placement of the guard drakes he had to go the opposite direction.

The Eat This twitter effect went off and kept a drake pinned down.  Then the next round the kicked off and the PCs kept making short work of the plaguechanged skeletons.  However the drakes on the other hand were all hitting the characters hard. By the end of the round all but two of the original plaguechanged skeletons were down, but the start of the third round fixed that.  

More climbed up out of the sewers and to the fortune a PC was in striking distance and so was the last remaining towns person.  The townsfolk was dropped, while PCs armor saved him.  It was that moment that the Heir stepped out from between the buildings and with flash of his sword he dropped two skeletons.  By the end of the round it was mostly a clean up operation for the party.  Only the Drow hunter was in any real danger.  The poor guy had been bloodied so many times his party was tired of healing him and he was now hovering at 2 HP.

The heir opened up the forth round and I might have put a bit to much description in to his actions.  One of the players commented "ok, we get it!  This guy is awesome.". With some good teamwork the PCs dropped the remaining drake.  They had pinned the poor then and immobilized it might have had a chance if someone else was rolling the saving throws.

The last beast fell and the townsfolk cheered their returned king.  Apparently the party's contribution wasn't worth cheering or it was completely forgotten. Being a man of the people he waved them away and pointed to the sky.  The battle wasn't done just yet, and the White Dragon arrived.  I ended the encounter and reminded the players to note what powers they had used and where they stood for hit points.  At this point I've left them with the impression that they won't be getting a short rest before they have to deal with the dragon.

Be back in a week, hopefully this report gives other DM's ideas.

-------------- Edit ---------------

Given's comment reminded me of something that I had forgotten to include in the post.  When there was only a single monster left on the battlefield. Two of the characters broke away from combat to rush over and help downed townsfolk.  In the end the party was able to save 3 of the townsfolk, while a fighter type went over and finished off the monster.  Sorry I forgot to include this in my original post.

World Wide Games Day - Gates of Neverdeath - Aug 6th

This Saturday I was one of the two DMs at Pendragon Games and Hobbies for the World Wide Games day.  We had 14 people come out.  One had intended to just watch but with a bit of peer pressure from me and his friends we got the guy tossing dice.  So it worked out to be two tables of seven, not ideal but we two of the regular DMs are at Gen-con (lucky bastards) you make do.  If you haven't played this yet and plan to in the new future you might want to skip this post for now.  I'll try not to give away to much but you might get some information you don't want from reading it as a player.

At one table was a group of friends who had all arrived together with one extra player. This group was mostly adults as well so rather then splitting them up I took the group of kids who had shown up and a couple my regular players. Now it is important to me that I note here that I normally run the adults table.  Not that I have anything against kids.  In fact I have two daughters and a grandson. It's just been a long time since I've had kids at my table, either way I've done my time and look forward to my regular group on wednesday.

The session was intended to start with thirty minutes of character.  To my surprise the kids already had characters. The oldest among them had built everyone characters, the down side to this was that he had done it for them.  So instead the thirty minutes was taken up with explaining the various powers to them and making sure they noted what they could do.  Honesty I am eternally grateful that they had characters already I don't think we could have pulled it off if they hadn't. There just wouldn't have been enough time.

We got the game started with everyone reading off there backgrounds from the bags.  It took a bit of card swapping but it all worked out in the end.  The bags where a really great idea. My experienced players liked the roleplaying benefits of them. As well as the in game benefit as well.  Although the only power that was used during the game was the Harper's Pin.

The group took on the assignment of bodyguard with little to no question. No one showed to much interest in what/who they were protecting or why. The only thing anyone wanted to do was to buy a Potion of Healing with their new found money. This came in very handy during the final encounter.  So once that was done we got on with the first encounter. To account for the additional players I added an extra wave of skeleton in round three, and two additional Zombies. 

Undead swarmed up on to the deck of the ship and keep many of the characters busy.  There ability to shift and attack allowed the undead a lot of freedom of movement.  Unfortunately it also pinned down the players so there wasn't a lot of movement on there part.  From the shore the archer fired from behind a cart and then hide after each shot.  None of the players ever got close enough to spot him, let alone attack him.

The biggest challenge of the encounter was drawing the characters away from Seldra long enough to hit her and steal the crown.  In the end I pulled one of the zombies back and bull rushed with a skeleton to get her into a good position.  In the end this worked out alright.  Oddly enough the only person to notice anything happening was the pre-gen druid's spirit animal.  The encounter ended at the end of the turn with the undead dropping back into the water and being struck down..

To my surprise this was the moment that the PC's decided it would be a good time to renegotiation their pay.  One of the youngest at the table argued that since they had arrived there job was done.  They ended up negotiating a pay increase of a 100 gold.  A natural 20 goes a long way in a diplomacy roll.

The skill challenge of the session came next and it moved along fairly quickly.  I started it off with an Athletics challenge for everyone at the table.  Only one succeeded out of the seven players, six healing surges eaten.  After I let the players suggest skills that they wanted to try.  That lead basically no where, the younger players just weren't comfortable enough with the characters or what they could do.  So in turn I started making suggestions and telling the story of what was happening based on their rolls. It worked really well and the kids where smiling.  Although I think I might have scared/mortified the young girl at the end of the table when I described how she Intimidated information out of someone.  I don't think she knew what the word meant until I explained it after-wards.  This type of story telling worked really well and kept everyone interested.  The group scored two failures really fast and then followed it up with 3 successes.  It could have gone either way, but in the end they failed the final challenge.

The final encounter brought us to the Neverdeath grave yard.  Tolivast was waiting and ready for them. His work on the crown complete he called forth his hounds and zombies and prepared to take on the party.  The hounds struck first darting in to various points among the party and biting down on a PC, those who hit shifted out of harms way and avoided clumping together.  Tolivast acted before the PC's could move and called forth skeletal hands that grabbed and clawed at them pc's, It wasn't a good start for the players But they got back into the game quickly

Ash zombies at the back of the group where the first to feel the party's blade.  There bloodied effect came as quiet the surprise to the players.  Over the combat was great and really well balanced.  Honestly it could have gone either way.  At one point I was fairly worried I had a TPK on my hands.  While none of the monsters were overly powerful worked very well together.  The combination of the Ash Zombies ability to prevent healing surges from being used and Tolivast aura along with his teleportation were absolutely deadly.  Of course his ability to attack and pull people into the aura equally deadly and responsible for at least one character falling.

The battle is nearly over, on the right side of the map Tolivast and his last hound
are both already bloody.  But then again so are most of the PCs

In the end PC eliminated  Tolivast support and then those still standing were able to get out of the his aura's affect and then hammered him with ranged attacks.  Seldra came in grabbed the crown and disappeared into the crowd before the watch arrived. We skipped the final skill challenge, due to time.

All in all it was a great session.  My thanks to Pierre and Reid for their patience.  It was a long day, working with inexperienced players.  I'm thinking at some point down the road I might run NewbieDMs game system RPGkids for all the new players.  Hopefully it will give them all a better feel what gaming is all about.  I know a couple of them are also just the right age for it as well.

Well that about sums up World Wide Games day report, now on to update Lost Crowd of Neverwinter to a level three adventure.

D&D Encounters Report - Session 10 - Dark Legacy of Evard

Sadly there won't be a session 10 report for a little while.  I arrived at our local brick and mortar store but the rest of my table didn't. There store still had two other tables of six so as a game it went pretty strong.  It is just that myself and the one other player who did make it decided, along with the DM, to delay the session until more people could make it to keep with the same group.  It also meant that we were able to head down and hang out at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival for the evening.

We did make it out to one play a D&D themed one, so I will be posting a review of that here later today.

D&D Encounters Report - Session 9 - Dark Legacy of Evard

So one of the things that’s kept me busy for the past year has been getting back into roleplaying games.  I’ve been a gamer since I was around 10 years old and have played pretty much most of the systems under the sun.  I started with Rolemaster in the eighties and then moved to Dungeon and Dragons just before 2^nd edition came out. So the plan here is to post a weekly summary of our adventures at D&D Encounters. 

Traditionally I’ve been the DM for this group but I arranged for another DM James to take over my table for this season so that I could play in another city while I was on vacation.  I’ll be back to DMing next season I don’t know just how that will affect me writing commentary on the encounters but I figure something out.  Until then I plan to do a bit of a mix of in-character writing and some out of game commentary on the encounter and on things like mechanics. 

I want to preface something about the in-character point of view stuff before I get started.  Original the group of players had decided to build an all human group.  In nine sessions we have not had a single one where we didn’t have some non-human jump into the group for the evening. Now through role-playing my character came out as a bit of a bigot and human centeric. Some of that attitude will come through in the post. Oh and the rest of the human’s in the group aren’t much better.

Our local brick and mortar store Pendragon Games and Hobbes as done pretty well by Encounters.  When I compare it to what I’ve heard about a lot of other stores. We’ve averaged 3 full or nearly full tables for a long time now.  1 table is made up of the adult players and the other two table have a decent mix of younger (IE newer Gamers) and more experienced players to others learn the game.

This week we got off to a bit of a slow start when a mother should up with 4 kids around twelve years old who all wanted to play.  It required more than a little bit of juggling to make sure everyone had a place to play.  We also had a player, who is known to DM time to time, show up late.  So he was parachuted in to run a fourth table.  Thankfully he was willing and only lived about five minutes away and hurried off to grab a few things he needed. By the time everything was set and ready to go we had three tables of six and one table of four.

We started off the encounter with the DM handing around a sheet with stat blocks for town guards.  The whole table really got excited at this. We all remembered how fun they were in Keep on the Borderlands.

Our Regular Party

Human Shaman – Keira

Human War Priest – Throne

Human Fighter – Ben

Human Bard – Drew DesJarling

The two additions to our table for this week

Drow Hunter – Belgos

Eladrin Wizard – Dracsal

The Halfling, if that is what he really was, had been pretty forth coming with information after a little bit of persuasion and fire.  I’m not sure which encouraged him more and I didn’t much care either.  Anything that would work with these shadow creatures and apparently army of the undead that planned to march on the city didn’t deserve any quarter.  This whole situation was keeping me from getting to the next town with the mail and making it to the taverns to perform.  Missing dates meant losing money as a Bard so I wanted to be done with this.

Once we had the information the group gathered around and I cast Comrades Succor.  Our big hitter Ben was getting pretty worn out and need whatever we could share. I wasn’t doing all that much better either.  Most of the group took part lending their strength to the ritual.  The Drow was the exception and I was exceedingly grateful for.

Comrades Succor is such a useful ritual in the Encounter style of play. The ability to share and spread out left over healing surges really adds to the survivability of the tanks and strikers.  The only problem was that in some of the Encounter seasons they seem to have forgotten to award gold.

As a group we began to patrol the streets and spread the word of the impending undead attack.  It was pretty clear from each group of townsfolk we passed that their spirits had been beaten.  A lot of the people seemed ready to just give up and maybe even flee town.  There wasn’t anyone of authority around so we took it upon ourselves to bolster their spirit.  Ben and Throne were the first to offer their own words of encouragement.  I was honestly surprised this didn’t lead to a mass suicide among those who heard their words.

I took control of the situation and stepped up calling on my gift of the gab and my training as a Bard and really inspired them to defend their homes.  To my surprise the Drow followed up with a threaten speech of his own that scared many of them and really sealed there resolve. Excited by the speeches Ben ran through the crowd cheering them on.  I couldn’t see it from my vantage point but I would wager all the gold I had he was grabbing asses where ever he could.  It didn’t do much for their mood, so I encouraged them to break themselves into smaller groups and patrol their town.  Mostly I wanted them away from my companions in case any of them tried again to improve their spirits.

As they split up and head on their way a small group from the watch approached us.  They had heard my words and wanted to accompany us as we patrolled. We are not ones to turn away help so we welcomed them and were on our way. There wasn’t a long wait before we found action. As we patrolled the streets a scream rose up from near the armoury and we rushed to investigate. 

It was initiative time Drew ended up with a respectable 17 which put him second among the players right after our Wizard.  I was a little surprised to see the map being reused a second time in the season, in fact this was the second time a map had been used twice so far.  I’m hoping that we don’t keep seeing the same maps over and over again.  At the same time it was interesting to come at the map from a different angle.

The snap of bow strings rang out from the skeletal warriors in tattered monk’s robes to announce the start of battle. I felt two sharp pains blossom in my chest.  Arrows had punched through my armour and embedded themselves into me. To my surprise the Wizard acted first his attention focused on one of the skeletons. It then turned as if a puppet on strings and attacked one of its numbers and dropped it.  Afterwards he ordered his guardsman to head around the far side of the building.

I sent my guard to the base of the Armoury and ran up the man like he was a ladder to get up on to its roof.  It would give me a little bit of cover and keep me from their blades.  As soon as I was in position I let out a staggering note that was enough to disrupt the magic and it crumbled a skeletal warrior right before my eyes.  As it turned out the roof might not have been my best move. A blazing skeleton on the bridge lobbed a ball of fire at me.  Thankfully his aim was awful and the flaming sphere ricocheted off the Armory and into the cart and started it smoldering.  At least for once I wasn’t the one setting things on fire.

From where I was I could hear several of the guards being sent around to the far side of the Armoury.  I learned later that the drow had gone with them. Now I’m not saying it’s was the drow’s fault or anything but it seems like it might be more than a coincidence that a lot of the guards didn’t make it back.

Thorne rushed to a nearby door and tried to open it, it was locked, then charged into combat and dropped another warrior.  His guard moved up behind him and dropped another with a crossbow then dropped prone. These things were dropping like flies around us.

Keira, our Shaman, conjured up her spirit companion a massive panther right next to the blazing skeleton.  The beast’s claws ripped blazing skeleton with a perfect strike.  From my vantage point on the roof I could see bits of smouldering bone splash into the stream as they flew over the rail.  She sent her guardsmen to join the drow and the others on the opposite side of the building.  I thought she had more sense than sending the poor man to his death like that.  Ben followed Keira’s lead and sent his member of the watch along with the other one and then moves up along the side of the build.  Everyone is left with an uneasy feeling that all of this was just too easy and that we have only seen the first wave of the enemy.

I could only just hear the twang of bow that was followed immediately by a scream as one of the guards fell.  The Wizard shimmered out of exisitance on the ground and joined me up on the roof of the armoury.  I catch sight of a few gestures from him and glow cage forms around one of the Blazing skeleton on the bridge that is currently fighting with Keira’s spirit companion 

Then the air is pierced by several screams coming from the far side of the building.  I had no doubt that the death of those men was exceeding painful. If we hadn’t been in the midst of combat I would have rushed to the men’s aid but they knew what they were getting into when they joined us.  Ever done dangerous work for the town already and it was way they joined us.  So I guess in a lot of ways they are just paying the price for it.

The roof of the armoury had gotten a little to crowd for me.  It didn’t help that the Eladrin wizard has an odd odour to him that I just had to get away from.  I leapt from the roof with the skill of a train acrobat, twisted in the air and landed on the back of the wagon.  Flames were starting to crawl up the front portion of it but I was able to land and slid off it to the back.  As my feet hit the ground I let out another long staggering note.  The energy of my scream focused on the blazing skeleton with the hopes of pushing him out of the energy cage he was trapped in. It screams as it passes through the bar, I only wish that stupid spirit companion of Keira’s would learn to take advantages of the opportunities I give it in combat.

The attack on the blazing skeleton brought up an interesting discussion and the idea of forced move causing damage.  The DM allowed it but warned that it wasn’t allowed for in the rules, because it had been allowed at the table in the past.  As a group of players we are far more focused on the story then a lot of groups we have seen and read about out.  In the case of things like Phamtom Cage when something is trapped in something and the power reads that it will take damage if it moves out of it I honestly think they should take that damage.  They are moving from the spot.  Beside most things that cause forced movement generally do less damage because they have that addition of forced movement.  So doing things like Phantom Cage and then causing forced movement is really just the players working together and they should be rewarded for that teamwork.

I can hear the sounds of more combat coming from the back of the armoury and I’m left to wonder if this is the second wave we had been expecting.  I wasn’t standing long enough to find out.  Two flaming spheres smashed into me and I drop like a rock.  Thankful, I wasn’t out of the fight for long, Throne and Keira both called upon the powers of the respective patrons and healed me.

At this point two of the players both realized there pencils have gone missing and I had apparently started a small collection of them.  Opps, say I admit it at gaming tables I am a pencil thief.  They say admitting you have a problem is the first step to solving it.

Ben charged the nearest remaining skeletal warrior and missed.  The two of them exchange blows but neither of them came out ahead.  Another skeletal warrior attacked and hit Throne with strong blow. 

Critical hits from minions are an absolute waste.  That will be a topic for an upcoming blog post, we’ve got a few house rules that we use at our regular table when it comes to Critical Hits and Fumbles.  I’ll talk about them at length but it will have to wait for another time.

The wizard tried to conjure something from up on the roof but it must have failed because I couldn’t see any effects on the battlefield.  At this point the first blazing skeleton is starting to sputter and does seem long for this world. A second one has arrived on the opposite side of the small stream that ran beside the armoury.  I call on a small amount of energy from the Feywild and pull Ben and Throne through it to place them in flaking positions against it.

I wave my guardsman forward to take a swing at the one on the bridge.  He drew his sword as he charged up the bridged and swings that skeleton. Sadly his footing wasn’t what it should have been and he misses.  The scream that came from his lips wasn’t one of frustration it was one of pain as the man flesh melted off his bones.

A quick out of character comment is required here because something happened here that Drew wasn’t privy to.  At the back of the Armoury the drow, hunter, was fighting an insubstantial creature of the Shadowfell all by himself.  The majority of the guards with him had already been killed by it.  He attacked and scored a critical hit then action pointed and did it again for another critical.  A few seconds afterwards the Shaman made an attacked and scored a critical as well. As a group we were all rolling super hot.

Across the river the blazing skeleton swings at Throne but misses.  Throne returns the favour and misses as well.  A blessing that came from his ancestral weapon enabled him to hit it on the return swing.  It would have missed had it not been for a timely distraction by Ben

Three of the players at our table rewards that we had received past seasons of Encounters. While only a couple of us Encounter Cards.  Ben and Throne both received the hundred point reward from Keep on the Borderland called Enchanted Heirloom that allows them to reroll a single attack.

The Shaman’s spirit attacked and took the head off the Blazing Skeleton. Which went splash and hissed as it fell into the stream.  Then she moved forward to the edge of the armoury to see what was left.  Across the river Ben swung at the final Blazing Skeleton and would have missed had it not been for the finely crafted family heirloom he used as a weapon.

One of the few remaining skeletons charged the shaman but missed. On the top of the armoury the Wizard decided he needed off the roof and makes jump for it.  He must have either seriously miss judged the distance or was a complete idiot.  I refuse to let my opinion of the Eladrin’s intelligence influence you the reader and will let you make up your own minds.  In the end he landed hard and fell on his ass.  A number of us offered what we considered to be helpful suggestions on how he could have done that better.  I have no doubt that he didn’t find them very helpful.

I switched to my bow and let an arrow fly across the stream.  I’m sure that there must have been water on the edge of the bridge or something cause I ended up slipping and landing flat on my back.  The irony of the timing wasn’t lost on me. The only thing that was really hurt was my pride, but I think the wizard couldn’t have been happier at the situation.  As I fell the drow rounded the corner and rambled about having fought something at the back of the building and fired an arrow that went wide as well.  From the far side of the building a guard appeared and missed with his crossbow.

The blazing skeleton must have been getting nervous if it was capable of such feeling any longer.  There wasn’t a lot on the field that could aid him.  His attack went wide and I shouted something across the stream that distracted him enough that he nearly fell into the stream.  A quick reach on his part prevented it but was not enough to keep him on his feet.  Throne took the opportunity to smash in the face of his prone opponent.  The final skeletal warrior met its end directly at the hands of the shaman with no assistance from her spirit companion.  A rare feat that I’ve only seen happen a couple of times since I met her.

With the last of them dispatched and the area clear we all hurried back to the Gray Owl.  There won’t be a lot of rest to be had on this day.  But we watch as the sun struggles to reclaim the land as its own from the Shadowfell.  When we wake up we learn from Grimbul the head of the town’s watch that the monks who attacked the armoury and a few other places about town all seem to have come from Saint Avarthil’s Monstry.  He has asked us to go there and check it.  I guess the mail will have to wait a few more days.

It was interesting to learn after the encounter that the opening piece was a skill challenge to see how the guards that joined us would react when faced with real combat.  Also that the results of last week’s encounter impacted this weeks and it meant that we didn’t have to face as much in the way of reinforcements.  As a player and as a DM I really like the way they brought the different encounters together and made one them affect the other.  It just gives them all so much more meaning.