D&D General How Was Your Last Session?

[Bitbrain]

Very good.

The long and short of it was they saved Keeper of the Flame Jaela from an assassination attempt by the Cult of the Inner Sun, and are now superstars in Thrane.

The players were delighted by their success, and even more excited when I informed them of my next campaign concept:

Eberron: the Next War.
Dungeons and Dragons meets Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2...

 

[atanakar]

After an epic fight the characters managed to kill the evil wizard that has been a torn in their side since the beginning of the campaign. But she was prepared for a life ending even so she had a Clone spell cast a while back. The characters do not know this. She was reborn at a distant location, in the country of an opposing baron who is currently attacking the character's barony. They are level 7. The action will move to the front of the war once spring arrives. For next game they will «clean up» the rest of the wizard's organisation, well those the can find !

 

[Oofta]

So in the current campaign, one of the things the group is tracking down is a series of cursed books, each associated to a different school of magic. They had been working with an NPC gnomish sage to help understand what the books were and how to stop them.

Unfortunately, the sage was being affected by the books and was unable to sleep. In desperation, he took a powerful sleeping draught. Now he can't wake up. In my campaign, the Shadowfell is not only the land of the dead (before they transition to their final resting place) and undead, it's also the land of especially vivid dreams. So the group went to the shadowfell to rescue their sage.

Skipping over a few details, the primary stuff included

• A fight against a zombie T-Rex that had been chasing dreamers down the street tried to swallow the dwarf.
• The gnome sage showed up driving a mech/warforged titan that he had always dreamed of building.
• Gnomes normally talk very, very quickly, but because they were in "his" dream he spoke very slowly and at first didn't understand why everyone else was speaking at a proper speed.
• The group needed to destroy his "memories" of the books for him to wake up, he also suspected there was an evil copy of him running around. He didn't tell the group (he would have, if pressed), but he was worried that if he woke up the evil version would take over.
• Because the memories were of books, they were of course in a grand library. The sage provided them library cards for entrance. They had to each present the cards to giant gnome guardian statues to get through.
• The first book was guarded by a clay golem that formed up out of the floor after the monk rolled a 1 on his stealth check. This particular book (evocation) had previously tempted the party's sorcerer, so after a failed save she once again just had to had the book to herself and tried to steal it. Eventually they set the book on fire and destroyed it but not after chasing a book flying around due to mage-hand.
• Next book started to buzz and vibrate as they entered the room, and giant flies (chasme demons) with heads that were twisted versions of the gnome sage flew out. Two of the PCs failed their saves and fell asleep, one of the demons tried to stuff the unconscious rogue into the book. Only able to get one leg into the book before she woke up, I described feeling maggots crawling all over the leg. Fortunately they had learned that fire was the best way to destroy the book - even if the rogue did take some damage before she completely extricated herself.
• As they were leaving they were confronted by the "evil" version of the sage who crashed through the ceiling in his own mech in the grand entrance to the library. While a couple of group attacked, the others ran for the door as the ceiling started to collapse. The monk was knocked unconscious, ceiling was collapsing and the front door was jammed. The fighter smashed down the door, the unconscious monk was dragged out of the way, the sorcerer's readied shatter spell took out the rest of the ceiling and causing the library to collapse as the group escaped. Was the evil version really killed, or just buried under rubble? Only time will tell.

A little more heavy on combat than some of my games, but overall quite fun. Maybe I need a new advertising slogan for the Shadowfell in my campaign "Shadowfell, where dreams come true and can kill you!"

 

[Cobalt Meridian]

I had a very odd session. My players are trying to retrieve a stolen brooch and were directed to a local fence. He pointed them to a Gnome Thief who was known to partake in a little bit of light corpse-robbing. The group headed over to the cemetery, located the thief who was in the process of being a "snack" for some vampire spawn. A fight ensues, resulting in the "chief" vampire being brought into the battle. The players were eventually victorious though.

I felt it was odd because it was a bit of a foregone conclusion that the group would win (the battle took place during the day and the vampire couldn't escape the crypt) and I don't think I really handled the vampire's various abilities well - although he did manage to charm the party's three heaviest hitters at one point I kept to forgetting to use the legendary actions. In my mind I ran it badly and I thought it felt really flat.

However, post-game multiple players have told me that they really enjoyed it and felt that their characters were in real danger. I'm really happy about that but I am now confused as to why my perception of the battle was so much different to theirs!

 

[prabe]

However, post-game multiple players have told me that they really enjoyed it and felt that their characters were in real danger. I'm really happy about that but I am now confused as to why my perception of the battle was so much different to theirs!

Possibly the players felt their characters were in real danger because they had a sense there was stuff the vampire was about to do, but never did. Or they were closer to dropping than you thought (dunno how closely you monitor PC hps; I don't at all).

 

[Len]

“Have you hit him yet?”
“No, I only bit him.”
“That’s not hitting, that’s just tasting.”

Also, my druid made friends with some bears. So, a good session.

 

[cmad1977]

Strahd is as defeated and the land of Barovia was saved. Through an amazing combination of foresight, clever planning, attention to detail and almost cartoon level luck at times the party defeated the Vampire in the bowels of his castle. The battle began near the top of the tower. Having prepared themselves well the party thought they had Strahd trapped. However, Strahds biggest strength(one of them I my opinion) is his mobility, particularly in his castle.
He led them on a chase through the castle, rousing allies and whittling the party members down bit by bit.

At last, deep in the crypts, the hero’s had him on the ropes and near death. Seeing his ruin before him, Strahd made a break for it. He raced down a long hall with a slide trap in the middle and into the teleportation room. He cast the green bead into the fire and ran to where the slide trap deposits it’s victim, hoping that one or more of the party would leap into the green flame and teleport away. It almost worked.
Had anyone, ANYONE else ran down the hallway it would have been a death sentence. He had already killed(3rd failed death save) one member of the party and grievously wounded 3 others. But no, the sun sword wielding fighter just happened to be the one to touch the slide trap first, depositing him in Strahds lap.
Using his legendary actions he tore up the slide and right into the rest of the party. The warlock was in front, he seized her, dove in for a bite... and CRIT! Massive boost to his survivability... the party members quailed in terror!...
but...
Entropic Ward... instead of a crit Strahd missed with an 11. With her next turn Morrigan the Warlock drew a bottle of holy water(that she had acquired in the very first session) and threw it in Strahds face... CRIT.
While the Vampire screamed in agony, clutching at his face, the now eyeless rogue Corben, who Strahd had mutilated early in the adventure, who had been driven to accept dark bargains in order to survive, decapitated Strahd.

TLR
It was fun.

 

[jasper]

One of my players who has social issues broke the module. He offered the devils a bribe which was so reasonable I had to go with it. Also the game nearly did not go on. I was feeling a little down due to the weather. The store was not open due the cashier being sick. The AL admin was being a little bit of a goober. I was about 2 miles away from the store when the admin ping me on messenger to say the store was opening. So last session started off bad but came out to be a great session. Then I was sick Monday.

 

[Stoutstien]

Updated session notes: party who have recently decided to become pirates docked in an open port on the edge of populated areas and found a seedy tavern to look for crew.
The rogue started to Network looking for hirlings, the barbarian got a date with the half ogre bouncer and the tortle bard nearly died trying to kill and cook a crab in a pot as a volunteer sous chef.

 

[prabe]

Erkonin #2, Session #12 (5E) Party starts session at 4th level.

Party moved from site where they previously ambushed one gnoll scouting party toward another scouting party, attempted to set another ambush. The ambush failed to work this time, but the party were still able to make relatively short work of the gnolls.

After that, the party retreated to a small fort on a nearby ranch, where the ranchers were holed up. They helped the ranchers fend off the gnolls, then they ran down a few escapees.

Then, they went to an unfortified village the gnolls had razed and found a vault/strongroom with some magic items in it.

Party advanced to 5th level.