Faerie Adventure

Nonei

Explorer
Thanks for the reply :) Glad you're enjoying it. Once we're done - in one or two more sessions - I'll write up a few things I would do differently if I could start over. I'm relatively satisfied so far, but I certainly wish I'd planned it out farther in advance so I could drop more hints. Hopefully that will be helpful as well :).
 

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Nonei

Explorer
Session 4

Sunshine and Travel
When Evol and Anett woke up that morning, they found that Menolly was her normal size again. They all gathered their things, and went for one more meeting with the queen.

The queen saw them off graciously, and directed them to the portal that will lead them home - along the mountains, past the Rose Dragon's lair, and towards the mountain with the flat top. She also took care to mention to avoid entering the seventh door within the dragon's lair 'or evil will befall you.'

Evol thanked her, and asked what needed to be done to end the twilight in the realm. The queen looked at her in surprise: "Have you not been outside? The sun has been shining for several hours! The night began to fall as soon as you held the power stone in your hand."

Evol murmered her relief (as too much more time in this chaotic land would be very taxing on a Paladin), and the others were happy as well.

They set off in the sun - too bright for Evol's eyes - and travel along the path toward the mountains. Soon, however, the path wanders off to the left and so they decide to continue straight ahead. Some of the trees start to look a bit... different. Perhaps more vivid, more lively if possible. They spot a Satyr or two a distance through the trees, and small animals abound.


The Clearing
Just as the land returns to twilight, they come across a small clearing in the woods and decide to make camp. Anett takes first watch, and the others lay in the soft grass, looking up at the most stars they've ever seen. Even though there is no moon, there is enough light from the stars to see forms and figures.

Anett is surprised to see a few lights floating through the woods, coming into the clearing. Soon there are more of them at the edge of the clearing, and she hears lively dancing music that almost demands a happy jig. In fact, both of her sleeping friends jump up, awake, with a smile and begin to dance! They ask her to join them, but she declines.

"I've heard stories of faerie music, I don't really want to be stuck here dancing for 100 years!" She shakes Menolly, who continues to dance, and then goes over to Evol and shakes her. Evol reluctantly stops dancing as she feels the pull fade, while Anett tries to bring Menolly out of it again. They stand there debating what to do for a short time, when Evol begins to get a far-away look in her eyes and starts swaying to the music.

Menolly backs up to the edge of the clearing - "I'm getting out of here!" Anett shakes Evol one more time and they leave the clearing together. Outside the clearing, they watch the lights move around and hear the music but it no longer seems to have the same pull. Then they realize... they left all their gear in the clearing.

A fast and furious debate ends with the realization that Anett had never been affected by the music, and the decision is made that she will venture in and gather the remaining items. Two trips and no dancing later, they are plus two backpacks and their weapons. A soft layer of pixie dust puffs up into the air and makes them sneeze, but they seem to have no other ill effect.

They lay down just outside the clearing, and attempt to finish their night. As dawn breaks for the second time in over a thousand years, the lights and music fade off into the woods.


The Rose Dragon's Cave
They rise, and stretch, and realize that the flat top mountain is in a slightly different place than when they went to sleep. But, no matter... they aim for it as they trek across rolling hills and begin to climb on a path along the edge of a tall mountain - Rose's mountain.

A dark mouth of a cave, too small for a dragon, leads off the path into the mountain ahead. Cautiously, they approach it, and hear a roar from within. Anett is positive it sounds like a bear and they hurry past, wanting to avoid a battle with an innocent creature.

And then, they see the Rose Dragon's cave. The mouth of the cave is 20 feet wide, and 20 feet high, and leads into the mountain. They pause a few feet into the mouth of the cave to discuss a plan.

Should they negotiate? Should they get physical? Should they try and best him at a game again? Should they even try to rescue the children that had been turned to stone - is it worth the risk?

Finally Menolly blinked with realization. "You know, we're discussing all this inside the mouth of his cave. He's probably listening to every word we're saying."

As one, they turn and look deeper into the cave. About 50 feet back, a shaft of sunlight pierces down from above and falls on the Rose dragon, who is lying comfortably in the middle of the room, watching them.

"Hello, mortals. It is good to see you again." He rises up, stretches, and smiles down at them.

They come forward into the room, and they see carefully arranged hundreds of perfect statues of fairy children, many smiling and laughing, others frozen in a scream of horror. A stone dryad peers from around a rock, and several stone pixies have been carefully hung from the high ceiling.

Menolly mutters, "If it gets physical in here, we'll have to be careful with that big dragon tail lashing around."

Rose swings his head to look at her with a little chuckle. "You're planning on getting physical?"

"Well... not necessarily." Then, to the others, "So, what's our plan?"
 
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Nonei

Explorer
Ok, I'm sorry I have taken so long to update this. But, I am here now, so here we go:

The Battle with Rose
The party discusses a few options, but are very reluctant to agree to anything that would include them serving an evil dragon. Menolly suggests an archery contest, but backs off when Rose readily agrees. Evol, the paladin, declines Rose's suggestion to see who can make the best lie - she isn't very good at lying.

Rose, bored with the hemming and hawing, begins talking about his favorite statue - his first one. It brings many pleasant memories... He indicates the statue with a claw. It is a small boy, maybe the equivalent of 6 years old, with a scream of terror frozen on his face.

Rose leans over to the party and suggests he's been getting tired of having all these statues around, and perhaps he'll just start tossing them over the edge of the cliff to watch them explode into powder below.

The party is still hesitant - they want to battle him but they don't want to kill him, for fear that won't be enough to break the spell. So Rose offers to have a battle to the... um... unconsciousness. He even agrees to not use his breath weapon. If the party wins, he will undo the spell on the children.

The party convinces him to agree that if he wins, they will speak of his embarrassing loss in the previous game to nobody.

Rose marks a 40-foot area in the entrance to the cave that the battle will be in. The party has a little trouble at first breaking through his thick hide, and by the end of the fight they are quite bloody - but the dragon is laying unconscious.

Rose keeps his word, and turns all of the children back into flesh. The older children immediately gather the younger ones and head back home, and the party continues on.


The Seventh Door
Just outside the mouth of Rose's cave, the path drops off a steep cliff 100 feet down. Anett, the Hadozee, jumps off, spreading her arms so her arm flaps can help her glide to the bottom, and Evol jumps after her, her ring slowing her descent so she floats safely to the ground. Menolly glares down from the top of the cliff at them, and pulls out her rope and grappling hook.

Once they are all at the bottom, Menolly notices a somewhat hidden opening in the face of the cliff. They move in to investigate and find a five foot wide tunnel, with doors all along the left side. They decide this is the place that the queen was speaking of, and begin to leave when Menolly hears a faint cry for help from down the tunnel and feels compelled to go in.

The others don't hear the cry, but agree to follow her. There are seven doors in total, but they aren't sure which door is #1, as the path continues and winds up, apparently to Rose's lair - did they enter at the end or the beginning?

So, they open Door #4 - the one in the middle - and find that it is full of piles of copper coins. They open the doors two either way (#2 and #6) and find piles of gold coins, and piles of red gems. As they are standing outside the door furthest from the entrance, debating on whether to open it or the one closest to the entrance, Menolly hears the cry for help from inside that door. This time, Evol hears it too, and gets the overwhelming urge to help whoever is making the cry.

She reaches to open the door, but it is locked. So, she puts her boot to it, and it bashes open. A little man walks out of the room and looks at them.

"Thank you, kind mortals, for rescuing me. May you find what you are looking for."

Anett mutters under her breath "I have heard that is a curse."

He begins to walk down the hallway, and Evol and Menolly feel their compulsions fade. A quick glance in the room reveals it full of piles of platinum, but no other creatures.

"Hey, wait!" "Come back here!"

The little man stops and turns around at their calls. He slowly walks backward toward the entrance as they talk, but Menolly uses her ring to create a forcewall behind him. He stands with his hand touching the forcewall as they grill him, and answers them with nervousness and apparent honesty. And glowing as evil to the Paladin.

Yes, he was put there as punishment. He had stolen the staff from the witch originally. Yes, he had compelled them to open the door. As they were talking he found the opportunity to ask, "So, what is it you are looking for?"

Evol snaps at him, "We are just looking for a way home!"

(more to come)
 
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Nonei

Explorer
Session 4 (cont)

The Way Home

After a fierce debate, the party decides to let the little man leave in peace, since he hasn't harmed them directly in any way (at least as far as they can tell). The rest of the day goes smoothly, and soon they are settling down for the night.

Each person's sleep is disturbed by a vivid dream... As they walk through the trees, a bolt of lightning shoots into the ground about 200 feet away to the side, and as they look that way, they see that it hit the ground just in front of a spot where two trees have entwined their branches above, forming an arc. As they gaze through the arc, an 8-pointed blue and white star twinkles at them from the sky beyond.

They wake refreshed in the morning, and discuss the shared dream and its meaning. They did recognize the star as the symbol of Bahamut, and as they journey through the woods towards the mountain with a flat top, they debate whether the lightning is an encouragement from Heironeous... or a warning.

Soon, sure enough, they see the trees that look just like they did in the dream. Anett decides to plunge ahead and walk under the arch... and disappears. The other two follow suit... and they find themselves in pitch black, with only Evol - as a drow - able to see.

Evol is silent for several moments, before confirming that it appears safe in response to Menolly's whispered question. The human and the Hadozee light their lights and find themselves in a smallish room carved of stone, and a wooden door in one end. Around them lie the bits and pieces of a child's room, destroyed long ago. Bed, chairs, toybox... even a few toys that are immediately recognizable as something a drow would give to their child. All along the walls are paintings and murals of twisted stories.

Anett whispers, "Where are we?"

Evol responds, "This is my room... from before. I'm back home, although I do not think of it that way any longer."

As they walk through the deserted drow village, they can see blood stains still on the ground, and Evol relates the slaughter of her village, and her parents, by the paladins of Heironeous when she was very young. They rescued the children from a life of evil, and she had been raised by the parents of one.

....................................................................

And here ends their trek into Faerie.

Epilogue (and fast summary of the last 2 1/2 sessions of the campaign): They find out that Evol's old home was inside the mountain they were headed for - the portal inexplicably placed them there (heh heh) instead of on top of the mountain. They did run into more drow, who had been preserving the area of the slaughter to try and raise their ancestors as an army so were pretty ticked at the party...

The party made it into the castle inside the volcano (the flat-topped mountain) where the portal to Tiamat's prison was, found out the only way to destroy Tiamat was to let her out (so they did), battled an aspect of Tiamat (while Bahamat and Heironeous kept the real one and Graz'zt busy), managed not to fall in the lava, and saved the day. Woo hoo!

I will try to post more on the numbers and how I feel like I did. I would love feedback - good and bad!! - this was definitely a learning experience for me!
 
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Nonei

Explorer
Ok, I updated the Creature and Setting information by Session. Let me know if there is additional information that you'd like to know.

Disclaimer: most of this thread I typed fairly fast, so I apologize in advance if it's confusing...

Thoughts: This adventure went fairly well, although it ended up being a "go in here and get the item you need and get out safely"... I would have liked it better if they had been able to get information or knowledge specfic to the fey that would have helped them, because then the setting itself would have been more important.

It would have been improved if I had tried more to link the different aspects of faerie together into a more cohesive storyline. Since it's a 'foreign land' and the normal 'rules' didn't apply, it would have gone smoother if I had thought of 3-4 "rules" that they could discover for themsleves and had them apply to a greater effect. They didn't really know what they should do for some of the time and were waiting for NPCs to tell them, so those parts didn't work very well.

Hopefully that will help anyone that tries to do an adventure int he future :)
 

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