Happy 4th, US ENWorlders. Since there seem to be a few people who actually read this thing, I thought I'd update. I was out of town for the holiday. So, no new 4e shenanigans this week.

I'd describe the awesomeness of blowing up a couple hundred dollars worth of fireworks for a dozen or so kids, but... well it was just a lot of fun for all around.

Anyway, looking forward to getting the whole group back together and kickin arse again next week and I'll update here following.

Wolf

Darkwolf71

This week, the group picked up their teeth and moved on to the kobolds lair. They were short both of their high-perception characters, the players were out of town, but of all people the Paladin made his passive check to hear the kobolds making conversation. That was the last thing that went really well for them. Instead of anyone rolling Perceptions, they decided to charge through the trees and attack the unseen foes. (good thing it wasn't a merchant caravan or something. ) I did mistakenly charge the Slinger into melee along with the Minions, so he wasn't able to go in and warn Irontooth. but heavy wounds were suffered and at one point the Warlord, the only Leader in the party went down. They did manage to pull out a win, bringing down the Dragonshield as he was trying to get to the lair and warn the others.

After a short rest, they entered the lair. Trying to stealth this time, but the first roll made was about an 8.

I have a much better handle on kobolds now, and monsters in general, I think. So this was very much a running battle. The party was able to eliminate Most of the minions, before IT came out to play, but the Skirmishers were still on the board. Add the other heavy hitters and IT himself and what we had was a potential massacre. PCs started dropping like flies, and I was even trying to be nice. I dropped, both Warlocks, had the Wizard running for his life, and the Fighter bouncing back and forth between bloodied and not. My dice were HOT. Everyone else’s were rolling badly, indeed. Even the fabled 'Red die' of the Paladin (AJ, the UGT owner) was rolling badly. In the end, the party won out, but not before suffering their first loss. One of the Warlocks failed three saves in a row. D E A D.

We moved on to the next encounter, This one was really pretty one sided. After not falling for the trap, the party moved immediately to take out the Slinger. He got one volley off nailing the Warforged with 2 of his 3 shot burst. (Surprising the heck out of the party, "He had three shots???" ) The rest of the enemies went down quickly to very well coordinated maneuverings by the party. Under the blankets in the pit, they found not only the Warlord's missing mentor, but a Half-Elf Cleric, who gladly joined the party. Now with two healers in group, they should fair much better.

After the session, I made a very important decision as to the progression of the campaign. I will not be using the 'every one has the same xp no matter what' rule. That one really bugs me. Sorry, but if you aren't there, did not contribute, why should you receive the benefits? But at the same time, I decided that dying PCs replacements will get xp for the encounter which killed them.

Darkwolf71

Last week UGT had our first 4e game. We had a slow start because I got called into work as we were about to start. Luckily it was a quick fix and we got rolling after a 3 hour delay or so.

Set up: KotS, with Eberron changes as noted in Dungeon #155.

We have a large group. 8 players at the table. Ages from mid 20's to early 40's. Party make up is... something like this:
Human Paladin
Eladrin Rogue
Tiefling Warlock
Tiefling Warlock
Human Wizard
Elf Ranger
Warforged Fighter
Human(?) Warlord

After a rushed set up, due to the late start. I git them on the road and into the first encounter. Things went fairly well, I had scaled the encounter up as noted in the DMG. Basically doubling the number of kobolds attacking. I will say this for 4e. The math for encounter building is very well done.

In an amusing bit of RP, one of the warlocks was basically saying, 'I am sent by your god, bow before your master'. Which, considering the backstory was very nice. He became the primary target, but the warforged and paladin managed to stay in the way and ensure that the kobolds were attacking them most of the time.

The second encounter was nasty. Nobody was able to spot the ambush. The kobold casters did some major damage with their orbs and the party basically let them continue unchallanged. The party was also expecting minions, so when none of the enemy was going down after the first hit they should have regrouped and talked stratagy, they did not. By the end of the encounter, I had started pulling punches. I could have taken out half of the party easily, but didn't want to do that in my first DMing session at the table.

No more. Tomorrow we go at it again and with luck we will be in the 'Irontooth' encounter. I'm not pulling punches. At least not as many. I have a better understanding of the Shifty trait of kobolds and will be using it to effect.

Darkwolf71

Yeah, so. I tried this 'blogging' thing once. During Hurricane Rita, which of course followed the catastrophic Hurricane Katrina. Not that it really matters, just pointing out that it was short lived. This may hold my interest longer, it may not.

As seen in my sig, I play at the 'Avenger' Ultimate Gaming Table. One of the most tricked out gaming rooms on the net, and certainly one of the largest gaming surfaces, 32 sq.ft. of 1" battle grid. (And yes dice still manage to hit the floor on a regular basis.)

I met this crew in July 2005. After seeing a link to the site in Riot's DDO pre-alpha forums, I asked if I could come check it out... and I just never left.

So, over the last three years we have played in many rotating campaigns. The World's Largest dungeon (cut short by some group dynamic issues). Deimos, our 'high-level PC's are destined to ascend to god-hood' campaign. Cydonia, a low/mid-leveled water world. A Dragonlance campaign. And a 2nd edition Shadowrun campaign.

All of these I have been a player in. I've toyed with the idea of running various types of games, from Call of Cthulhu to Year of the Zombie. Nothing ever panned out, for whatever reason.

Come the announcement of 4e. Most of the group was indifferent, one was absolutely repulsed and two of us were... cautiously optimistic. Despite my reservations I knew we would have to at least try the system out. How could we be gamers and not? So, I decided to buy in, sight unseen. This would be the game that I would GM.

Assuming interest holds up, I plan to run through the WotC published series. My timeline may be a bit behind the publishing schedule, due to the other campaigns, but it is what it is.

So, new system, new campaign, new blog. It all makes sense, no?

Right. Well, we'll see about that.

A summary of our first session to follow...

Darkwolf71