Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
Playing the Game
Story Hour
The Diary of Dalan Ratslayer
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Dalan" data-source="post: 56596" data-attributes="member: 791"><p><strong>A new member, an old member, and a some freed hostages.</strong></p><p></p><p>19th Nightal</p><p></p><p>Feeling a little better, we resumed our efforts to explore the caverns. </p><p></p><p>We found an orc-built wooden door, and heard someone making noise behind it. A quick look at the floor allowed me to determine that the door didn’t get opened much, and would probably be quite loud and attract a fair bit of attention once it was. </p><p></p><p>We left it behind for the time being to try and find the exit Tanzi had seen two days earlier. The large stone doors looked quite familiar, and once it was determined safe enough, we pushed it open. We’d found our way back to the chasm that had taken Balmor’s life. Since the bridge was still out, we headed back up to the wooden door; after paying our respects. Finding the door locked, I let Saren go ahead and try to trick the inhabitants into letting us in. The only thing we heard was more muffled struggling. After the priest and I agreed that it sounded like someone trying to shout through a gag, Tanzi and Nawoom charged the door as one and more or less obliterated it. </p><p></p><p>Once we freed and fed the two halfling prisoners, I managed to calm them down and convince them that, appearances and behaviour aside, none of my companions had any interest in harming them. Reassured that we really were rescuing them, the halflings told us that they were taken prisoner when their caravan was raided and had been left to rot in the cage while the orcs waited to see if anyone was interested in paying for them. </p><p></p><p>With charges in tow, our explorations were now focused mainly on finding a way out of the orcs’ lair so that we could return them to civilization. Since the caverns had been explored, we headed for the hallway at the far end of the storage room. At one end we found a short staircase leading to a door and another door just before the hall ended with a large statue of a dwarf. Apparently oblivious to what happened last time we mucked about with things with carved dwarven images, Saren happily waltzed right up to the statue, and set off some sort of gas trap. It didn’t seem to do anything to him the first time, but the gas didn’t look at all healthy. I guess he forgot to hold his breath the second time though, because after the second burst of green vapour flowed from the statue, our resident loon looked quite ill. Since Saren was done playing with dangerous statuary, we opened the door and moved into what seemed like a pretty disgusting bunkroom. Tanzi and Saren went into looter mode while I kept watch on Nawoom to make sure he didn’t threaten to eat the halflings. </p><p></p><p>Still hoping to find a way out, or at least the room with the arrowslits, we carefully approached the door at the top of the stairs. It seems that the human skull that was nailed to the door was just Ulfe’s way of saying “No Admittance” and not a warning of deadly traps ahead. After seeing the state of the ogre’s room, we were no longer surprised by his horrid stench. If you’re not smart enough to disregard your own feces, can you really be considered to be more than an animal? </p><p></p><p>Having still not found an exit, we decided we’d have to head back into the dungeon and check the far end of the hall. We didn’t have to go far before finding a second bunkroom, not significantly different from the first. </p><p></p><p>With all the halls and tunnels and rooms in the orc’s lair searched – and surprisingly empty since at least two of the orcs had escaped alive – we had no choice but to return to the room with the stairs and the fire trap. After Tanzi again bent the bars apart, we all climbed through. Worried more about one of them setting it off than about lighting them on fire, I made certain that everyone stayed well away from the dwarf-faced door as I desperately searched for the triggering mechanism, or at least the openings that the alchemist’s fire had blasted out of. Unable to find anything, and having neither the skill nor equipment nor strength to open the other door, we had no choice but to go deeper into the Glitterhame in our efforts to get out of it. </p><p></p><p>After descending deeper into the mountain for a few minutes, we discovered an underground stream that had cut into the rough stairwell. It wasn’t very wide, or very deep, but it was very cold, and quite fast. We managed to get across just before the stirges attacked. </p><p></p><p>I’m really, really starting to dislike stirges. </p><p></p><p>This lower level seems to be mostly vast caverns and cold, fast, deep streams. The stairs led into the first of several such caverns. After looking around for a few moments (made a lot easier by the bits of phosphorescent moss growing on the walls and ceilings), I decided to investigate the small shelf on the wall just above the point that the stream entered the wall. While I didn’t find any stashes of gold to donate to Lathander, I did discover that some sort of three-toed bipeds were crawling through the opening fairly frequently. Curiosity satisfied, I encouraged everyone to jump across the stream so that we could continue our search for a way out. Tanzi and Saren both made the jump without too much difficulty, but Nawoom the Turtle Priest, unsurprisingly, managed to jump only a few feet, and landed squarely in the centre of the water. Saren dove into the water before anyone had time to tell him what getting that cold can do to a person. While Saren fought the current, Tanzi simply reached down and hauled Nawoom out of the water with a single lift. Once Saren climbed out of the river and began stripping his soaked clothing off, I encouraged the halfling merchants to take running jumps across the river. I suppose that wasn’t really the best idea though, since Geradil didn’t get much further than Nawoom. Saren, somehow still able to function while turning blue, dove back in to save the little guy while Courana quailed at the sight of her husband floating downstream. Once Geradil was returned to dry land, I acquiesced to the halfling-tossing plan that the others had suggested earlier. I really had expected the merchants to be able to jump better than an armour-plated, overweight priest though. Once Courana was across, thankfully without any serious injury, I was the only one left. The massive blood loss that the stirges had inflicted on me chose the final step of my run up to cause me to nearly faint – I suppose there would have been more inopportune moments to collapse, but I doubt that most of them would have been as embarrassing as that. </p><p></p><p>Finally beyond the accursed streams, we began exploring the caverns. By this point, the rest of the party seemed to have forgotten about our goal of getting the halflings home to Blaisingdell – every time I tried to point out that getting ourselves killed by doing something stupid would be a bad thing, they began to make “coward” comments. At me. The hero of this little group of lunatics and loot seekers. So I wasn’t really surprised when Tanzi insisted on looting the dwarven tombs we found, despite the warning about Moradin’s curse befalling desecraters. </p><p></p><p>I have to admit though; the chain she found me is a thing of beauty. Courana read enough of the dwarven runes on it to tell me that it has the entire story of the Forge of Fury written on its links. I’m going to have to spend some time trying to decipher the whole thing next time we have some significant downtime. For now I’ll simply have to accept using it to remove the orc scum from these dwarven halls. </p><p></p><p>Not far from the tomb, we found yet another underground stream. This one was much bigger and moving much faster though. A quick investigation proved that the roaring sound we’d heard was in fact a waterfall, just as we had thought. It’s really too bad that we hadn’t made more of an effort to look at the rest of the cavern though – we might have noticed how slippery the rock near the water was before we started sliding down it. I’ll just have to look on the bright side – I can add going over a waterfall to the list of things I’ve survived… </p><p></p><p>After recovering Courana – and my new chain – we returned to main cavern and began following the path through the fungal forest, toward the steel door we’d seen from the vantage point of the tomb area. While we didn’t get attacked by anything hiding between the giant mushrooms (yet) – Saren and Nawoom did manage to attract the attention of some sort of tentacled monsters that were hiding on top of a ledge that the path went right next to. </p><p></p><p>My attempts to free Saren from the mass of tentacles that were wrapped around his head were thwarted when a third set attacked me and began hauling me up into the air while choking out what life was left in me. Before I passed out, I saw Raven and some elf come wandering out of the mushroom forest. When I woke up a little later, on the ground at Tanzi’s feet, Saren was busy trying to pick a fight with the new guy. </p><p></p><p>No longer all that interested in the door, or much of anything else for that matter, we fell back to the hall between this room and the river to make camp. While this new druid fellow went off to gather some edible mushroom, Raven explained something about a cursed ring that takes him to the Shadow plane and then back to normal reality at random times. I wonder if it will always bring him to where the rest of us are?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Dalan, post: 56596, member: 791"] [b]A new member, an old member, and a some freed hostages.[/b] 19th Nightal Feeling a little better, we resumed our efforts to explore the caverns. We found an orc-built wooden door, and heard someone making noise behind it. A quick look at the floor allowed me to determine that the door didn’t get opened much, and would probably be quite loud and attract a fair bit of attention once it was. We left it behind for the time being to try and find the exit Tanzi had seen two days earlier. The large stone doors looked quite familiar, and once it was determined safe enough, we pushed it open. We’d found our way back to the chasm that had taken Balmor’s life. Since the bridge was still out, we headed back up to the wooden door; after paying our respects. Finding the door locked, I let Saren go ahead and try to trick the inhabitants into letting us in. The only thing we heard was more muffled struggling. After the priest and I agreed that it sounded like someone trying to shout through a gag, Tanzi and Nawoom charged the door as one and more or less obliterated it. Once we freed and fed the two halfling prisoners, I managed to calm them down and convince them that, appearances and behaviour aside, none of my companions had any interest in harming them. Reassured that we really were rescuing them, the halflings told us that they were taken prisoner when their caravan was raided and had been left to rot in the cage while the orcs waited to see if anyone was interested in paying for them. With charges in tow, our explorations were now focused mainly on finding a way out of the orcs’ lair so that we could return them to civilization. Since the caverns had been explored, we headed for the hallway at the far end of the storage room. At one end we found a short staircase leading to a door and another door just before the hall ended with a large statue of a dwarf. Apparently oblivious to what happened last time we mucked about with things with carved dwarven images, Saren happily waltzed right up to the statue, and set off some sort of gas trap. It didn’t seem to do anything to him the first time, but the gas didn’t look at all healthy. I guess he forgot to hold his breath the second time though, because after the second burst of green vapour flowed from the statue, our resident loon looked quite ill. Since Saren was done playing with dangerous statuary, we opened the door and moved into what seemed like a pretty disgusting bunkroom. Tanzi and Saren went into looter mode while I kept watch on Nawoom to make sure he didn’t threaten to eat the halflings. Still hoping to find a way out, or at least the room with the arrowslits, we carefully approached the door at the top of the stairs. It seems that the human skull that was nailed to the door was just Ulfe’s way of saying “No Admittance” and not a warning of deadly traps ahead. After seeing the state of the ogre’s room, we were no longer surprised by his horrid stench. If you’re not smart enough to disregard your own feces, can you really be considered to be more than an animal? Having still not found an exit, we decided we’d have to head back into the dungeon and check the far end of the hall. We didn’t have to go far before finding a second bunkroom, not significantly different from the first. With all the halls and tunnels and rooms in the orc’s lair searched – and surprisingly empty since at least two of the orcs had escaped alive – we had no choice but to return to the room with the stairs and the fire trap. After Tanzi again bent the bars apart, we all climbed through. Worried more about one of them setting it off than about lighting them on fire, I made certain that everyone stayed well away from the dwarf-faced door as I desperately searched for the triggering mechanism, or at least the openings that the alchemist’s fire had blasted out of. Unable to find anything, and having neither the skill nor equipment nor strength to open the other door, we had no choice but to go deeper into the Glitterhame in our efforts to get out of it. After descending deeper into the mountain for a few minutes, we discovered an underground stream that had cut into the rough stairwell. It wasn’t very wide, or very deep, but it was very cold, and quite fast. We managed to get across just before the stirges attacked. I’m really, really starting to dislike stirges. This lower level seems to be mostly vast caverns and cold, fast, deep streams. The stairs led into the first of several such caverns. After looking around for a few moments (made a lot easier by the bits of phosphorescent moss growing on the walls and ceilings), I decided to investigate the small shelf on the wall just above the point that the stream entered the wall. While I didn’t find any stashes of gold to donate to Lathander, I did discover that some sort of three-toed bipeds were crawling through the opening fairly frequently. Curiosity satisfied, I encouraged everyone to jump across the stream so that we could continue our search for a way out. Tanzi and Saren both made the jump without too much difficulty, but Nawoom the Turtle Priest, unsurprisingly, managed to jump only a few feet, and landed squarely in the centre of the water. Saren dove into the water before anyone had time to tell him what getting that cold can do to a person. While Saren fought the current, Tanzi simply reached down and hauled Nawoom out of the water with a single lift. Once Saren climbed out of the river and began stripping his soaked clothing off, I encouraged the halfling merchants to take running jumps across the river. I suppose that wasn’t really the best idea though, since Geradil didn’t get much further than Nawoom. Saren, somehow still able to function while turning blue, dove back in to save the little guy while Courana quailed at the sight of her husband floating downstream. Once Geradil was returned to dry land, I acquiesced to the halfling-tossing plan that the others had suggested earlier. I really had expected the merchants to be able to jump better than an armour-plated, overweight priest though. Once Courana was across, thankfully without any serious injury, I was the only one left. The massive blood loss that the stirges had inflicted on me chose the final step of my run up to cause me to nearly faint – I suppose there would have been more inopportune moments to collapse, but I doubt that most of them would have been as embarrassing as that. Finally beyond the accursed streams, we began exploring the caverns. By this point, the rest of the party seemed to have forgotten about our goal of getting the halflings home to Blaisingdell – every time I tried to point out that getting ourselves killed by doing something stupid would be a bad thing, they began to make “coward” comments. At me. The hero of this little group of lunatics and loot seekers. So I wasn’t really surprised when Tanzi insisted on looting the dwarven tombs we found, despite the warning about Moradin’s curse befalling desecraters. I have to admit though; the chain she found me is a thing of beauty. Courana read enough of the dwarven runes on it to tell me that it has the entire story of the Forge of Fury written on its links. I’m going to have to spend some time trying to decipher the whole thing next time we have some significant downtime. For now I’ll simply have to accept using it to remove the orc scum from these dwarven halls. Not far from the tomb, we found yet another underground stream. This one was much bigger and moving much faster though. A quick investigation proved that the roaring sound we’d heard was in fact a waterfall, just as we had thought. It’s really too bad that we hadn’t made more of an effort to look at the rest of the cavern though – we might have noticed how slippery the rock near the water was before we started sliding down it. I’ll just have to look on the bright side – I can add going over a waterfall to the list of things I’ve survived… After recovering Courana – and my new chain – we returned to main cavern and began following the path through the fungal forest, toward the steel door we’d seen from the vantage point of the tomb area. While we didn’t get attacked by anything hiding between the giant mushrooms (yet) – Saren and Nawoom did manage to attract the attention of some sort of tentacled monsters that were hiding on top of a ledge that the path went right next to. My attempts to free Saren from the mass of tentacles that were wrapped around his head were thwarted when a third set attacked me and began hauling me up into the air while choking out what life was left in me. Before I passed out, I saw Raven and some elf come wandering out of the mushroom forest. When I woke up a little later, on the ground at Tanzi’s feet, Saren was busy trying to pick a fight with the new guy. No longer all that interested in the door, or much of anything else for that matter, we fell back to the hall between this room and the river to make camp. While this new druid fellow went off to gather some edible mushroom, Raven explained something about a cursed ring that takes him to the Shadow plane and then back to normal reality at random times. I wonder if it will always bring him to where the rest of us are? [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
Playing the Game
Story Hour
The Diary of Dalan Ratslayer
Top