D&D General How Was Your Last Session?

[Guest 7034872]

Busy. Precipitous.

Still, they made it out alive and are now much better aware of the danger into which they're headed, so overall I call it a successful night.

 

[corwyn77]

So it was D&D night at my local University gamers' club. We had a pretty big turnout so I offered to run a table for Mines of Pandelver - an adventure I've never run, played, or even read. In my frost turn I critted, dropping one pc. One tpk later, I turned the first encounter into a slasher-type prologue, as the real protagonists came upon the bodies and we proceeded from there.

For the last fight of the first act, three of the PCs approached the goblin scouts and asked if they had seen a wagon around here. The lookout said he didn't but his boss might have. They were then escorted straight to the boss, bypassing over half of the lair. The other two PCs went around the outside and found another entrance (improvised me so they could get involved) and they combined two encounters (3?) that they managed to beat, just barely.

 

[Richards]

In tonight's "Ghourmand Vale" session, we were sent to check out the sewers and found the blockage: a pile of 40-50 dead bodies clogging up a grate. However, close examination revealed the corpses had all been exsanguinated, and each had telltale vampiric puncture marks on their necks. We fought an otyugh in the sewers (who didn't want us taking away his pile of "meat"), and then when we traced the bodies back to their source (upriver), we ended up fighting Carly, the teenage vampire spawn who we'd fought twice before and turned her to mist each time (but had never been able to track her back to her coffin), this time in her lair and with a 4th-level evil human cleric aiding her. We managed to kill them both, and when she returned to her coffin we were able to permanently kill her: our archer snapped an arrow in half and pierced the impromptu "wooden stake" through her heart, and then our paladin carried her dead body into the river feeding into the sewers, letting the running water dissolve her body into nothingness. And just like that, we finally rid the world of a teenage vampire spawn. (They're the worst!)

In other news, my PC's sister-in-law gave birth to twins, one boy and one girl. We'll likely be asked to return to Greyhawk City to inform my PC's older brother, as his wife was sent our way to keep her out of reach of his enemies.

Johnathan

 

[Vael]

Session 1 of Light of Xaryxis: Went well. I have an interesting mix of PCs ... only 1 full spellcaster: I've 2 fighters, a Paladin, an Artificer and a Cleric. And a Rogue that didn't join this week.

They're more bloodthirsty than expected, went full out on both the initial Astral Blights and didn't even try to negotiate at the docks and managed to blow through Traevus and his 10 thugs. But they're off into Space and generally heroic.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

45th and 46th sessions of my Dragon Heist/Deck of Many Things mashup. Three player characters at level 9: Half-orc cavalier fighter, halfling swashbuckler rogue, and half-elf evoker wizard/grave cleric.

We're getting to the end game -- probably 6-8 sessions remaining. Most of session 45 was the players plotting their next move. The most important development is that the rogue reconnected with his nemesis-slash-love-interest, an investigator in the City Watch. She asked to join the party to take out the Arcane Brotherhood wizard that's been a major campaign antagonist. Cool beans, right? Well, what the players don't know is that the investigator is actually a changeling assassin duplicating her form -- and working for an entirely different campaign antagonist. The real investigator is in a death trap that the players will have to take on in their next adventure.

Session 46 was a brawl. The wizard has fortified himself in a seatower off the coast of Waterdeep. The characters and their allies decided on a pincer movement, entering the tower from the top and bottom. Seemed smart on paper. Unfortunately, it only served to divide the party.

Up top, the rogue and fighter flew in on a griffon. The rogue leapt through a window to enter the tower. The fighter circled toward the roof. Guarding the roof was the fighter's stepfather, a nefarious noble that the fighter had killed 20 sessions ago. Well, the Arcane Brotherhood had brought him back as a CR 19 Death Knight. I found out the hard way that this might be slightly too powerful for the characters. Just a bit.

Inside the tower, the rogue encountered the fighter's stepbrother and stepsister -- likewise killed earlier in the campaign and now resurrected as undead. He was able to take them both out with minimal hassle.

At the bottom of the tower, the elf wizard and an allied drow warrior fought a zombie swarm.

The griffon grabbed the Death Knight and carried him out to sea. The Death Knight fireballed the griffon and fighter. The fighter made his save but the griffon was toast. The fighter administered a healing potion to the griffon, then kicked the Death Knight loose. The Death Knight plummeted into the sea.

The wizard and drow warrior made ranged attacks on the Death Knight. It emerged from the sea and used destructive wave to great effect. The wizard responded with thunderwave, hurling the Death Knight back into the ocean. Realizing they were outmatched, the wizard led the drow into the tower.

Unfortunately, they encountered yet another resurrected enemy -- a warlock that had killed the elf wizard earlier in the campaign. The wizard was already down to a handful of hit points, and the blight spell brought him low.

Next session: The Book of Vile Darkness!

 

[Older Beholder]

I ran the 2nd session of my version of Dark Sun (mostly using the Spelljammer 5E books)
It was another session of wandering the desert and random encounter tables, as none of the characters are proficient in survival. I switched to the OneD&D rule for exhaustion which I thought worked pretty well.

We opened with the group being pursued by a Braxat from the previous session.
They were rescued by a group of Thri-kreens and led to a watering hole. At the oasis the group avoided a confrontation with a stegosaurus only to be attacked by a Gaj.

After recuperating for a couple of days the group set out again towards where they believe the nearest city is located. Another day or so later they met a Centaur traveler who gave a bit of detail about the world that they'd come to, warning them against travelling south. He agreed to take them to the nearest city.

Approaching the city on the distant horizon the group encounter an Ogre dragging a dragonborn on a chain, as we rolled initiative I asked the players if they wanted to do the fight to finish the session or leave it as a cliffhanger to kick off the next session. One player was pretty tired so we held off till next time.

It's a pretty simple get from point A to point B plot at this point, but the players had fun and seemed to enjoy it.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

44th session of Monte Cook's 3E Banewarrens campaign run with Shadow of the Demon Lord on Owlbear Rodeo. Five player characters at level 8.

• Dwarf Executioner/Berserker/Warrior. He now wields the sacred Axehammer of the Lost Clan.
• Elf Librarian/Wizard/Magician. Outcast from elven lands, raised in Ptolus, keeper of a dark secret. His magical traditions are Arcana, Teleportation, Chaos, and Fey.
• Goblin Pyromancer/Oracle/Magician. Responsible for the destruction of his tribe. Specialized in the Fire and Forbidden magic traditions, with a dose of Divination.
• Changeling Dervish/Spellbinder/Rogue. Created by House Vladaam to replace a child they kidnapped and held in servitude. Naturally, she wants revenge. Two weapon fighter with the Battle tradition.
• Human Defender/Paladin/Priest. Cleric of Lothian, the primary god of Ptolus. His magical traditions are Life, Theurgy, and Battle. His murdered wife was has returned as undead and now he seeks to stop her.

The characters arrived at the Baneheart, the final location within the Banewarrens. But this was primarily a session of planning and plotting.

We started with the players sharing with each other their new level 8 abilities. SotDL gives a relatively small number of features at each new level. The power curve is modest -- but real. The game is designed for very quick leveling. In this campaign leveling has been slow, so reaching level 8 felt a bit underwhelming.

The wizard found the final piece of the staff of shards -- his signature magic item -- which gave him the ability to teleport the entire party a significant distance.

Next, they debated what to do with the two rival adventurers they had captured. The alchemist, Skeemo, tried to weasel his way into their good graces. They decided to keep him alive, despite an expected betrayal. The goblin's player volunteered to build out Skeemo's character sheet. Most players were in favor of killing the evil pixie, Glitterdeath. The paladin protested. He pretended to kill her out of sight of Skeemo, but actually stashed her in his backpack. (She was under the sleep effect of a fairy arrow.)

Yet it wasn't long before the rivals' patron, Aliastar Vladaam, magically contacted them. He spoke through the mouth of the unconscious pixie. The changeling rogue pretended to be the leader of the rivals and claimed the player characters had been defeated, dead or scattered in the Banewarrens. Aliastar said numerous banes had escaped into the city. Ptolus was in chaos. And some of the dead we're rising as undead.

The banes and the undead all pointed to yet another rival faction -- the Dreadsworn, a group of undead led by a corrupted Inquisitor of the Church of Lothian.

We then reviewed all the bad guys, their motivations, and what they desired within the Banewarrens.

The players decided not to return to Ptolus and instead go deeper into the Banewarrens. Their goal is to recover the Key of Making -- the original key that can destroy all the other Bane Keys. Unfortunately, that key is on the remains of the Dread One, the evil creator of the Banewarrens -- somewhere high up in the Baneheart.

Next session: Flying high!

 

[Richards]

In today's "Dreams of Erthe" campaign, the PCs:

• Rescued a dwarven woman from a dream of a minotaur hunting her in a shifting maze
• Were asked to check on her husband (and her sister's husband), both miners who had been in the mines for over a week now
• Were refused entry into the mines, and would have tried sneaking in if they hadn't spotted miners passing crystals over to living crystal scorpions who skittered up the cliff wall, who took them to a cave a mere 10 feet above the lava at the bottom of the cleft
• Made it to the cave (via 4 PCs inside an extradimensional lamp carried by the 5th PC under a gaseous form spell) safely
• Split up, so the crystal dragon spying on them from above only got 3 PCs with its breath weapon
• Used predominantly ranged touch spells to fight off the dragon, while 3 crysmals (the crystalline scorpions) skittered up from a back cave
• Killed the dragon and pried an ioun stone from its forehead
• Killed the psionic, floating brain (a "brainstorm") that emerged from the dragon's head (actually from the Ethereal Plane, but that's what it looked like to the PCs)
• Heard a stone giant climbing down from above on a massive chain, so they sealed off the cave entrance with a wall of stone spell
• Went to the back cave, to discover a massive crystal golem lying on its back, inert
• Saw seven more brainstorms enter the golem cave from the Ethereal Plane (releasing the miners they'd dominated in the levels above the PCs had bypassed by going straight to the lower cave)
• Killed 6 of the 7 before the last one could enter the golem and animate it
• Killed the golem, but not after it had slain the half-orc cleric/paladin (first PC death this campaign!) and knocked out the dwarven cleric
• Killed the remaining brainstorm that re-emerged from the golem once it had been destroyed
• Gathered up the crystal dragon's treasure, which almost was enough to have a true resurrection spell cast upon the half-orc later on (the 5 PCs split the cost to pay the remaining amount)
• Got the full story from the stone giant and dwarf miners: they'd unearthed psionic crystals in their silver mine, a crystal "attuned" itself to the psionic crystal dragon's mind and created a brainstorm, which then copied itself in the brains of seven dwarven miners, and then forced the remaining miners to continuously unearth more of the psionic crystals so the crysmals (brought from the Elemental Plane of Earth by the dragon) could assemble a crystal golem for the brainstorm hivemind to inhabit

Johnathan

 

[jasper]

Friday's session made feel like the NPC who loses his cool Tonight to pad and flesh out the city, two tinker gnomes tried to help Bubbles. Well the life jacket did not work but while he was floating down the river I gave two other players knucklehead trout to attack him. Now I have undead knucklehead trout which are stalking him.
While I hit the bathroom, I gave open player DM power to roleplay the kender using the experimental pop up tent. Now one kender has a pogo stick as mount.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

So ... I ran my Session 0 for Light of Xaryxis ... and ... my Session 0s need work. Or at least, I need to manage my own expectations. Or maybe my players are just too used to building characters as an individual exercise.

I went in, figuring ... here's where I can let the Players collaborate, do some shared world-building and such.

This shouldn't be too spoilery, but the adventure begins on any world, it gets threatened by an out of this world threat. PCs begin at 5th level, so I told them, they can choose the world and how they know each other, mentioned my planned house-rules (not doing the usual strict initiative and trying out the OneDnD playtest rules around Inspiration). And after a brief nixing on Dark Sun, Dragonlance was settled on, there was some discussion on general classes and concepts and then everyone kinda dispersed.

So, I dunno. I thought I'd get more discussion, more engagement, but that didn't happen. It didn't help that there was a very phased in arrival, it's an online game and I really miss playing DnD in person, but yeah, is this kinda how session 0s are?

I find that it helps to be proactive about this and;

A) tell the players you’d like them to collaborate

And

B) have prompts ready for each player that start or end with a question about thier pc, but also contribute to the worldbuilding.