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The Adventures of the Endhome 6+1. Rebirth of Barakus! (9-27-06, 19 and 20 back up)
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<blockquote data-quote="Scorch" data-source="post: 3075003" data-attributes="member: 1502"><p><strong>Adventure 7 Summary</strong></p><p></p><p>Barakus is a campaign that our group plays between sessions of our main campaign run by WizarDru, who plays Ravenspur. Typically it is when not all the players can make the main game or if WizarDru is too burned out or did not have time to put together an adventure. I always have the books ready to play at a moment’s notice, which is why I picked Barakus. We can just pick up and go from where we left off.</p><p></p><p>I had such grandiose plans for using miniatures, Hirst Arts, and Dwarven Forge pieces to layout the entire dungeon but after a point I came to realize that it would slow down the pace of the game. Laying out the pieces beforehand, transporting them over to the house we played at, and storing them there would be a chore. Instead I went to on old standby: the one-inch grid presentation tablet.</p><p></p><p>I picked up two from the local office supply store and I spent the night drawing out the entire first level of Barakus, the caverns, on the first twenty pages of the tablet. I then made some pieces of paper I could use to cover up the unexplored parts of the map and reveal them as the party moved on. I traced it all out with colored markers to add some flavor. I also re-read the entire first level adventure and made notes of the possible creatures they could run across. Going through all our miniature collections I laid aside all the figures they could run across. </p><p></p><p>This lead to one awkward exchange between me and Valanthe, who plays Absinthe:</p><p></p><p>“So you bought the basic D&D box set at Southern Exposure?” I asked.</p><p></p><p>“Yeah, why?”</p><p></p><p>“Well I need to get something out of it.”</p><p></p><p>“It is over there. What do you need out of it.”</p><p></p><p>“Oh, nothing important.” I replied as I palmed the black dragon medium sized mini out of it.</p><p></p><p>Having this all prepared. I started the next session of Barakus.</p><p></p><p>The party had just finished off the monstrous spiders hiding underneath the sand pile in the northwest corner of the map. The sound of their combat had alerted the Pogin gang who were hiding in the cave above (I rolled their listen checks and got some high numbers). They shined a lantern down the hole in the floor at the back of their cavern so they could see what was happening. Spot checks by Adson and Ravenspur alerted the party to the source of light down the corridor from where they were. The party debated for a bit in silence and during this time the Pogin Gang decided to seal up the hole with some boards and place heavy boxes on top of them. They were taking no chances. The party decided to move on.</p><p></p><p>Standard marching order was set up and the group moved east down the corridor. Absinthe was able to hear and eventually see six kobolds practicing with crossbows up ahead. Unfortunately as she approached she did not spot the trip-wire, which dropped a net on top of her. She was promptly entangled. The rest of the group charged forward at the six kobolds who had time to fire off their first round of crossbow shots. Five of the six kobolds went down but the sixth near the back went charging off to the south to warn the rest of the tribe while his comrades died.</p><p></p><p>The group heard a warning horn blow and knew that they had just kicked over an anthill. I rolled a d4 and came up with 2, which was how long it would take the kobolds to get organized and attack. I made a note that two rounds into the next combat that the kobold rogue sorcerer would lead a strike force around and attack the party from the rear through the passageway leading from the east.</p><p></p><p>The group formed up with their bricks in the front while Ravenspur and Keldin moved to the east to provide fire support while keeping an eye on the eastern exit. Ravenspur’s player made sure I knew he was keeping an eye out.</p><p></p><p>The kobolds formed up ranks and all moved on the same init. The first wave was to use up AoOs as they charged forward to try and get the flank. Some made it, some died. The crossbow target range soon became a killing ground as kobolds swarmed into the room. The party were slaughtering kobolds but were slowly being overwhelmed by the numbers.</p><p></p><p>The kobold rogue then made his move and his hide and move silent rolls exceeded the spot and listen checks of Ravenspur. The sly kobold got his sneak attack in and I thought I was about to have my first character kill when I rolled double ones for damage.</p><p></p><p>“You are SO lucky!” I snarled at Ravenspur’s player.</p><p></p><p>The group knew a new threat when they saw it and two of them spent a round to turn around and annihilate the poor kobold before he could do more mischief. The strike team that followed did a little better and the party was now flanked. Keldin and Ravenspur backpedaled through the party to get clear of the kobolds and their stabbing blades.</p><p></p><p>The tide had turned after another round of combat as my dice failed me and the party started hitting their stride. Soon all the kobolds were dead. The tribe had been wiped out root and branch. The adventurers took a breather and heal up their wounds before taking a body count. They had fought over 20 kobolds and won. Careful exploration of the rest of the kobold complex revealed no survivors.</p><p></p><p>The party then decided to investigate the hole back near the spider cave. I did a quick ruling on what the DC was to climb up the hole without a rope secured at the top and the monk took 20 and made it up no problem. He started banging on the wooden covering the Pogins had placed over the hole and they came to investigate, weapons drawn. Based on their write up in the module I decided that they were pretty fearful of anything in the caves so after an initial scare they realized they were looking at a human and did not attack. Adson conversed with them for a few minutes, letting them know that the kobolds had been destroyed. The brothers and their half-orc compatriot were not looking for trouble and thanked the monk for the news. Adson dropped back down the hole and let the party know who was up there and that there was another exit from the caverns there as well. </p><p></p><p>The party then decided to range east and south from the kobold caves and came to the western edge of the giant cavern containing the lake. They decided to avoid it and start investigating some passages to the west to see if they linked up with what they discovered already. </p><p></p><p>The tunnel they chose lead to the stone pillar containing the Warrior’s Prayer. They made note of it and continued exploring eventually coming across the strange cave with the three stone rocks and the red circle on the floor. After poking and prodding they stumbled across how to activate the ritual to drain CON from three players by 2 and place 4 on the player in the circle. Unfortunately one of the players drained was Absinthe who dropped down to a CON of 6. I told the players that she was not looking so good, even worse than she normally looked. The asthmatic elf decided that she could not go on for the rest of the day and needed to rest. Adson, on the other hand, was the picture of health, just having gotten 4 more CON. The party decided to rest for the day in the cave.</p><p></p><p>They set watches and I rolled on the random encounter table, dropping encounters that made no sense considering where they were and also that they had wiped out most of what was in the western half of the caverns. They waked the next day with the effects of the CON drain/boost gone and ready for adventure. </p><p></p><p>While they had breakfast, Keldin started worrying about the horse they had left outside. He and Curley volunteered to sneak back the way they had come to check on the horse. The rest of the party stayed and got ready for the day. Since Keldin’s player was not attending this session and Curley was an NPC this was just my way of setting up another encounter.</p><p></p><p>Keldin returned and reported that an ogre was now in the entrance cave where they had fought the ghoul. This was the ogre from the east who was happy now that he could leave the caverns. The party came up with a cunning plan to take it out and free up the southern exit from the caves.</p><p></p><p>While Absinthe snuck into the cave and hid, the others would raise a ruckus and draw the ogre into the northern passageway. The bricks would be up front fighting while the rogue would come up from behind for the sneak attack. Absinthe was able to gain entry to the cave without drawing the ogre’s notice. The party started making noise and the monster went to investigate. It charged in with its club and smashed the monk knocking him down to low single digits. One more hit and he would probably die. Ravenspur then cast the Daze spell and the ogre failed the save. It would lose its next action.</p><p></p><p>We found out later that we had made a mistake here. We thought that the ogre was a humanoid and thus affected by the spell but it was a giant. None of us knew this until a few days after this session but the mistake probably saved a few lives. Live and learn.</p><p></p><p>With the ogre dazed the party moved in and hacked it to pieces in the space on one round. The monk was healed up and the ranger went and checked on the horse: it was okay.</p><p></p><p>Still feeling up for a fight the party then investigated the caves to the east of the entrance. They winded their way through several empty caverns and Absinthe’s keen ears picked up sounds from ahead. She snuck up to where the cave passageway widened and she saw two rodent humanoids on guard duty.</p><p></p><p>“WERERATS!” squeaked Absinthe’s player. We ended the session for the night on that note.</p><p></p><p>The session was probably the most fun the players had according to the feedback they gave. They loved the kobold encounter. Ravenspur’s player stated that it had a great low level encounter feel to it in that the dice could turn at any moment and members of the group could certainly die. I tried to play the kobolds intelligently with them setting up flanks and moving in formation and the result worked out very well. </p><p></p><p>Next Session: Where oh where are the were-rats?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Scorch, post: 3075003, member: 1502"] [b]Adventure 7 Summary[/b] Barakus is a campaign that our group plays between sessions of our main campaign run by WizarDru, who plays Ravenspur. Typically it is when not all the players can make the main game or if WizarDru is too burned out or did not have time to put together an adventure. I always have the books ready to play at a moment’s notice, which is why I picked Barakus. We can just pick up and go from where we left off. I had such grandiose plans for using miniatures, Hirst Arts, and Dwarven Forge pieces to layout the entire dungeon but after a point I came to realize that it would slow down the pace of the game. Laying out the pieces beforehand, transporting them over to the house we played at, and storing them there would be a chore. Instead I went to on old standby: the one-inch grid presentation tablet. I picked up two from the local office supply store and I spent the night drawing out the entire first level of Barakus, the caverns, on the first twenty pages of the tablet. I then made some pieces of paper I could use to cover up the unexplored parts of the map and reveal them as the party moved on. I traced it all out with colored markers to add some flavor. I also re-read the entire first level adventure and made notes of the possible creatures they could run across. Going through all our miniature collections I laid aside all the figures they could run across. This lead to one awkward exchange between me and Valanthe, who plays Absinthe: “So you bought the basic D&D box set at Southern Exposure?” I asked. “Yeah, why?” “Well I need to get something out of it.” “It is over there. What do you need out of it.” “Oh, nothing important.” I replied as I palmed the black dragon medium sized mini out of it. Having this all prepared. I started the next session of Barakus. The party had just finished off the monstrous spiders hiding underneath the sand pile in the northwest corner of the map. The sound of their combat had alerted the Pogin gang who were hiding in the cave above (I rolled their listen checks and got some high numbers). They shined a lantern down the hole in the floor at the back of their cavern so they could see what was happening. Spot checks by Adson and Ravenspur alerted the party to the source of light down the corridor from where they were. The party debated for a bit in silence and during this time the Pogin Gang decided to seal up the hole with some boards and place heavy boxes on top of them. They were taking no chances. The party decided to move on. Standard marching order was set up and the group moved east down the corridor. Absinthe was able to hear and eventually see six kobolds practicing with crossbows up ahead. Unfortunately as she approached she did not spot the trip-wire, which dropped a net on top of her. She was promptly entangled. The rest of the group charged forward at the six kobolds who had time to fire off their first round of crossbow shots. Five of the six kobolds went down but the sixth near the back went charging off to the south to warn the rest of the tribe while his comrades died. The group heard a warning horn blow and knew that they had just kicked over an anthill. I rolled a d4 and came up with 2, which was how long it would take the kobolds to get organized and attack. I made a note that two rounds into the next combat that the kobold rogue sorcerer would lead a strike force around and attack the party from the rear through the passageway leading from the east. The group formed up with their bricks in the front while Ravenspur and Keldin moved to the east to provide fire support while keeping an eye on the eastern exit. Ravenspur’s player made sure I knew he was keeping an eye out. The kobolds formed up ranks and all moved on the same init. The first wave was to use up AoOs as they charged forward to try and get the flank. Some made it, some died. The crossbow target range soon became a killing ground as kobolds swarmed into the room. The party were slaughtering kobolds but were slowly being overwhelmed by the numbers. The kobold rogue then made his move and his hide and move silent rolls exceeded the spot and listen checks of Ravenspur. The sly kobold got his sneak attack in and I thought I was about to have my first character kill when I rolled double ones for damage. “You are SO lucky!” I snarled at Ravenspur’s player. The group knew a new threat when they saw it and two of them spent a round to turn around and annihilate the poor kobold before he could do more mischief. The strike team that followed did a little better and the party was now flanked. Keldin and Ravenspur backpedaled through the party to get clear of the kobolds and their stabbing blades. The tide had turned after another round of combat as my dice failed me and the party started hitting their stride. Soon all the kobolds were dead. The tribe had been wiped out root and branch. The adventurers took a breather and heal up their wounds before taking a body count. They had fought over 20 kobolds and won. Careful exploration of the rest of the kobold complex revealed no survivors. The party then decided to investigate the hole back near the spider cave. I did a quick ruling on what the DC was to climb up the hole without a rope secured at the top and the monk took 20 and made it up no problem. He started banging on the wooden covering the Pogins had placed over the hole and they came to investigate, weapons drawn. Based on their write up in the module I decided that they were pretty fearful of anything in the caves so after an initial scare they realized they were looking at a human and did not attack. Adson conversed with them for a few minutes, letting them know that the kobolds had been destroyed. The brothers and their half-orc compatriot were not looking for trouble and thanked the monk for the news. Adson dropped back down the hole and let the party know who was up there and that there was another exit from the caverns there as well. The party then decided to range east and south from the kobold caves and came to the western edge of the giant cavern containing the lake. They decided to avoid it and start investigating some passages to the west to see if they linked up with what they discovered already. The tunnel they chose lead to the stone pillar containing the Warrior’s Prayer. They made note of it and continued exploring eventually coming across the strange cave with the three stone rocks and the red circle on the floor. After poking and prodding they stumbled across how to activate the ritual to drain CON from three players by 2 and place 4 on the player in the circle. Unfortunately one of the players drained was Absinthe who dropped down to a CON of 6. I told the players that she was not looking so good, even worse than she normally looked. The asthmatic elf decided that she could not go on for the rest of the day and needed to rest. Adson, on the other hand, was the picture of health, just having gotten 4 more CON. The party decided to rest for the day in the cave. They set watches and I rolled on the random encounter table, dropping encounters that made no sense considering where they were and also that they had wiped out most of what was in the western half of the caverns. They waked the next day with the effects of the CON drain/boost gone and ready for adventure. While they had breakfast, Keldin started worrying about the horse they had left outside. He and Curley volunteered to sneak back the way they had come to check on the horse. The rest of the party stayed and got ready for the day. Since Keldin’s player was not attending this session and Curley was an NPC this was just my way of setting up another encounter. Keldin returned and reported that an ogre was now in the entrance cave where they had fought the ghoul. This was the ogre from the east who was happy now that he could leave the caverns. The party came up with a cunning plan to take it out and free up the southern exit from the caves. While Absinthe snuck into the cave and hid, the others would raise a ruckus and draw the ogre into the northern passageway. The bricks would be up front fighting while the rogue would come up from behind for the sneak attack. Absinthe was able to gain entry to the cave without drawing the ogre’s notice. The party started making noise and the monster went to investigate. It charged in with its club and smashed the monk knocking him down to low single digits. One more hit and he would probably die. Ravenspur then cast the Daze spell and the ogre failed the save. It would lose its next action. We found out later that we had made a mistake here. We thought that the ogre was a humanoid and thus affected by the spell but it was a giant. None of us knew this until a few days after this session but the mistake probably saved a few lives. Live and learn. With the ogre dazed the party moved in and hacked it to pieces in the space on one round. The monk was healed up and the ranger went and checked on the horse: it was okay. Still feeling up for a fight the party then investigated the caves to the east of the entrance. They winded their way through several empty caverns and Absinthe’s keen ears picked up sounds from ahead. She snuck up to where the cave passageway widened and she saw two rodent humanoids on guard duty. “WERERATS!” squeaked Absinthe’s player. We ended the session for the night on that note. The session was probably the most fun the players had according to the feedback they gave. They loved the kobold encounter. Ravenspur’s player stated that it had a great low level encounter feel to it in that the dice could turn at any moment and members of the group could certainly die. I tried to play the kobolds intelligently with them setting up flanks and moving in formation and the result worked out very well. Next Session: Where oh where are the were-rats? [/QUOTE]
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