D&D General How Was Your Last Session?

[werecorpse]

I GMed but feedback suggests it went well. It was a beach house Friday - Sunday session with 8 players & GM. Homebrew slow 5e D&D campaign (1/10th xp running since 2015). A good session that resulted in a couple of big in campaign reveals so I was happy and the players seem to be as well. Fair X card warning it’s some nasty in game concepts.
The party tracked down an astral lair of a githyanki renegade known as the golden king holding hundreds of kidnapped babies that were being held there in stasis. He was holding them for a faction of the yuan ti the party is working against who are preparing for a ceremony to resurrect their god. They managed to sneak into the fortress, avoiding most of it and briefly “allying” with a githyanki member of the group that wants to reunite yanki & zerai before they killed the golden king and stole the mirror ball in which the babies were stored. They were lauded when they returned to the city. This was a high point.
Following this success the dwarf pc wanted to pursue a line of enquiry to figure out why his home city once the centre of a dwarven kingdom was now such an underpopulated miserable place. It that had once seemingly warred unceasingly with the Duergar but was now at peace with them. Also he had heard rumours that the Duergar had enslaved mountain dwarves so he thought to maybe free some and bring them home? He knew that in the Underdark the Duergar armies had defeated the drow and now slow warred with a ghoul/illithid alliance. So with this mission in mind the party went below. They met a ghoul outpost and decided that despite the Duergar being their enemy it’s enemy was a worse type of evil. The session ended as they were assaulting a Duergar station where they were told some dwarves were kept after having been told that the reasons the Duergar continually attacked the dwarf city in the past is that the city had an elder brain beneath it feeding on it and the reason they stopped is that the dwarves made some deal with fiendish forces for protection which seemed to result in the dwarves handing over hundreds of their people as slaves to the Duergar. Further that the slaves are being used to mine toxic magical minerals which both mutate the dwarves into monstrous warriors and imprint/detoxify the minerals making them useable by those of dwarf blood (Ie the Duergar). This revelation of how screwed up things were for the dwarves was an “in character” low point. But the player enjoyed having made some progress on the mystery he has been chipping away at for literally years despite it being pretty dark and somewhat overwhelming.

 

[Older Beholder]

Last night went mostly okay, though we went over time by a half hour, and I think probably I should have cut it short to avoid that.

There is one common problem I'm up against: how can a DM best make combat go faster? We spent way too long on a combat interaction after everything went haywire in keeping with my intended plot line. I seriously want to improve my time efficiency here so we can resolve combat in at least half the time it currently takes. Any tips from the experienced DMs?

I guess the first thing is to identify what's slowing the combat down, are players having to constantly look up spells? Do you have to re-explain what's happening for each players action due to them not paying attention? Is it a large group? Are they high level? Some of these things you can't do much about, other than get new players.

From the DM side of the screen I tend to write out monster stat blocks in my notes so if there are multiple types of enemies I have them all in one spot and don't have to flick back and forth between books. It adds to prep time, and might not matter if you're using online tools.

One thing I did with my last session was have monsters that were higher DC than usual, but had already been damaged from other fights, so were often at half HP. It meant the fights were more dangerous as the enemies could do big damage, but were quicker to take down. It also helped create a sense of the world being alive, in a 'monster hunter' kind of way.

Rolling both damage and attack at the same time can save time too.

 

[werecorpse]

Last night went mostly okay, though we went over time by a half hour, and I think probably I should have cut it short to avoid that.

There is one common problem I'm up against: how can a DM best make combat go faster? We spent way too long on a combat interaction after everything went haywire in keeping with my intended plot line. I seriously want to improve my time efficiency here so we can resolve combat in at least half the time it currently takes. Any tips from the experienced DMs?

Less monsters, less to track.

 

[Guest 7034872]

It's an old video (2017), and in it Professor Dungeon Master posted a video that really helps answer my question about speeding up combat:


That simple trick helps a lot, I think. Another thing I've figured out since Tuesday is that I need two screens to run combat well (we're doing it long distance over Zoom, so one computer screen is for seeing people's faces): if I use my laptop to keep all the monster/foe stats immediately handy, I won't have to keep clicking back and forth between different desktop tabs. I'm trying both this and Prof. Dungeon Master's trick for next week.

 

[el-remmen]

Fantastic and fun!

The entire 5-hour session was the back end of a LONG tactical combat that began the session before with the PCs defending a roadhouse from waves of goblins, ogres, and trolls.

I also gave each player an NPC to run (a member of the family who own the inn) with a few lines of personality and preferences and instructions that for each of the NPCs who survive the encounter the party would get bonus XP. This added an additional layer of complication and stakes the players really enjoyed.

Every member of the party dropped to the dying condition at least once (the barbarian twice!) except for the gnome bard/wizard who managed to go the entire fight without taking a single hit point of damage! Only one NPC died, Custus the Grandpa was eaten by a troll named Gumbo, after distracting it to allow his son and grandson to escape.

Of course, we left off with one remaining complication (well, two - but the second is less immediate), the inn is burning from all the fire used to fight the trolls.

 

[Bupp]

Party was traveling with a small caravan (5 wagons) and were ambushed by 2 bulette, who kept attacking the giant goats that were pulling the wagons. A 400' race to the remains of a crumbled ancient bridge that they could then be trapped on.

Characters were jumping on and off moving wagons, while the aaracokra land druid was flying others around as well.

Four wagons made it. They lost 3 of the 10 giant goats. Two of the remaining wagons are damaged. Only one of the 20 civilians died.

Not they are stranded on this bridge with a mixed group of NPCs (a merchant and his teamsters and guards, a gnomish inventor and his family, and a down on their luck entertainment troupe.

Next session they will have face the circling landsharks, dwindling supplies, and rising tempers. A pair of giant vultures will appear. A nest of ghouls lives on the underside of the bridge (another party that were similarly trapped and resorted to cannibalism).

The fight was tons of fun, with the landsharks jumping in and out of the ground. No one knew where they would appear next! (Usually under one of the goats).

 

[THEMNGMNT]

39th session of my Dragon Heist/Deck of Many Things mashup. 8th level half-orc cavalier fighter, halfling swashbuckler rogue, and half-elf evoker wizard/grave cleric. This session was a continuation of an epic fight through the drow-held Citadel of the Bloody Hand below Mount Waterdeep. The mind flayer nemesis of the PCs has killed or enthralled all the drow in the stronghold. The PCs battled their way into the throne room and faced the drow high priestess and numerous waves of her spidery minions. They endured insect plague and cloudkill. A 6-attack action surge from the fighter finally brought her down. The rogue snatched up her magical rapier -- Silken Spite from the Wildemount campaign guide.

Next session: Ceremorphosis!

 

[THEMNGMNT]

20th session of Monte Cook's 3E Banewarrens campaign run with Shadow of the Demon Lord on Owlbear Rodeo.

Five player characters at Level 4:

• Dwarf Fighter/Warrior. Heir to a lost kingdom. His trinket is half of a treasure map.
• Elf Wizard/Magician. Outcast from elven lands, raised in Ptolus, keeper of a dark secret. His magical traditions are Arcana, Teleportation, Chaos, and Fey.
• Goblin Oracle/Magician. Responsible for the destruction of his tribe. Specialized in the Fire and Forbidden magic traditions.
• Changeling Spellbinder/Magician. Created by House Vladaam to replace a child they kidnapped and held in servitude. Naturally, she wants revenge. Celestial and Battle traditions.
• Human Paladin/Priest. Cleric of Lothian, the primary god of Ptolus. His magical traditions are Life, Theurgy, and Battle. His wife was murdered by undead and now he seeks answers.

The PCs are nearing the end of the Outer Vaults. In the published adventure, it calls for one of the adventurers to be kidnapped by the Pactlords of the Quaan. Only problem with that is it's exceptionally hard to orchestrate in reality. Player characters do not seem to be kidnapped as easily as a movie characters. Basically, I was skeptical of being able to pull it off, so I planned to skip it.

Enter the PCs...

In this session the PCs finished exploring the Outer Vaults. They reached a Sealed Door. They could immediately tell this was the entrance to another level of the dungeon. They debated whether or not to proceed -- sure, the Banewarrens were breached, but this Sealed Door effectively kept anyone from going any further. If the characters stopped here, they could contain the damage. Or, if they used the Bane Key to unlock the door, they could continue the quest to find the key that would allow them to seal all the doors -- but they would be leading their foes deeper into the Banewarrens. Ultimately, they decided to continue.

And that's when things went wrong.

See, they had found a trio of automatons elsewhere in the dungeon which they were using to set off traps, etc. They had positioned one of the automatons at a lower level to sound an alarm if anyone tried to come up behind them. The dwarf's player said he'd go back to get the automaton.

"So...you go down to the lower level by yourself?"

"Yes," said the player.

"Okay." I turned to the other players (virtually) and said, "Ten minutes go by and Ragnar does not return. Then twenty minutes. Then thirty. What do you do?"

"Oh, no," said the original player, laughing.

The other characters went down to the lower level, where they found the automaton destroyed and their friend missing. And a ransom note. It told them to leave the Banewarrens and wait for additional communication.

Immediately the players suspected House Vladaam of the kidnapping. Especially the dwarf's player. Of course, it's not the Vladaams. So I'll need to correct that eventually...

The characters exited the Banewarrens, trudged through the sewers, and climbed the rope up the hole leading into the abandoned manor. The human paladin was the first in line. As his head came up through the hole, he found himself surrounded by a dozen guards from House Vladaam. All aiming crossbows at his face. With them were a group of evil adventurers led by the dwarf, Astrid Nightstone. Astrid signaled for him to be silent and come inside. He thought about it for a moment and said, "We've got company!"

A dozen crossbow bolts fired at him at once. Nine of them missed! The three that hit did 30 points of damage...and he had 31 hit points!

The paladin slid down the rope and landed in the muck of the sewers. The characters started firing spells up through the hole, including a couple doozies that disrupted the Vladaams. They decided to stand their ground, using it as a chokepoint, and taking out as many enemies as possible.

The players are more convinced than ever the Vladaams are responsible for the kidnapping. In fact, they simply tracked the players to this abandoned manor after numerous forays in and out of the dungeon.

Assuming the player characters survive this fight, they'll hit Level 5 soon after.

Next session: Battle in the sewers!

 

[el-remmen]

It was cancelled last minute due to a medical emergency ( ), but thankfully everything turned out okay and we have rescheduled for next weekend.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

Last night I ran the final battle of my Underdark campaign I began in August 2020. The 15th-level party, made up of a dwarf bard/cleric, shadar-kai monk, kenku rogue, and dragonborn sorcerer, faced off first with Doresain (after defeating much of his ghoul nobility) and then with an only slightly weakened aspect of Orcus.

The shadar-kai monk slew at least a dozen of the ghouls swarming the room (as a Long Death Monk, this also meant he had a fairly reliable means of getting temp HP), ran across the heads of a tightly-packed ghoul horde to get to a platform, and at one point ran up a wall to give a potion of healing to the flying rogue before jumping off, teleporting, and slow falling to another platform.

The dwarf bard/cleric dealt a ton of thunder damage to strong earth elemental ally of Doresain's, prayed to the her goddess just before the aspect of Orcus' appearance and obtained some healing for the entire party, and was able to inflict Bestow Curse on Orcus (who I rolled a natural one for on his save).

The kenku rogue picked off several of Doresain's more dangerous allies, such as a bodak, maurezhi, and a crypt thing that could teleport the party into dangerous positions. At one point he pulled the unconscious monk to safety from advancing ghouls by grabbing him and flying away to a nearby platform.

The dragonborn sorcerer summoned a draconic spirit to help fight and dealt a ton of damage with spells like sunbeam and a metamagic radiant fireball. He ended up dealing the final blows to both Doresain and the aspect of Orcus, the latter of which he suffered a parting power word kill. The monk was able to use a rope of climbing to pull the sorcerer's body from the ledge he'd been on for the bard/cleric to restore him with revivify.

All in all I'm very proud with how the four hour final battle went down. I feel like I gave each character a role to play in the fight: support from the bard/cleric and a powerful earth elemental for her to shatter (one that had petrified her and the monk sessions before, which added urgency to defeating it), ghoul minions for the monk to mow down and terrain for him to navigate with his unparalleled mobility, more dangerous creatures for the rogue to snipe, and powerful bosses (Doresain and Orcus) for the sorcerer to unload his greatest spells against. I think my only regret is I didn't have a dragon miniature for the sorcerer's player to use (he brought the behir mini we used as a substitute).