Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Musing Mage" data-source="post: 8429717" data-attributes="member: 7025552">1st Ed AD&D, Forgotten Realms (Cormyr) continues...Kyla the Kensai's mini-session (as outlined above) was a success but left her with some wounds to heal, so she bowed out to convalesce. By some strange coincidence her player also could not make it to the session. Amazing how these things just work out! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" />Feltuun the Dwarven fighter is joined by Arash the Ranger, friend and colleague to the fallen Braern. Both are joined by two guest players running Gnome Illusionist/Thief siblings.Feltuun wants to act fast and retrieve the 10k buried electrum before the Dwarven Assassin and Elf Fighter/thief from the other group can get to it, so they head out with haste.A cold snap has settled upon the land bringing early winter conditions prompting rolls against frostbite, but they take precautions and find their way to the burial site of Braern and Dastan (the fallen Ranger/Cleric and Kensai from previous session). The bodies have been dug up and looted, confirming the groups concern that the thieves' guild has beaten them to the punch. They push forward after re-burying their former comrades, and arrive at the site where they hid the rest of the loot.What they find is a group of men mysteriously slaughtered, and all the electrum already dug up and left behind! The Ranger's tracking fails, and he is unable to ascertain any clues as to what killed these men and women. They quickly load up their treasure and retreat back the way they came.En route home, an old woman from a distant homestead frantically approaches stating that a group of men took her grandchild, and went north. The ranger, unwilling to walk away without investigating the claim, is ultimately joined by the teammates who while suspecting a trap of some kind (old lady all alone on the frontier? Hello?) they feel it would be wrong not to try.A family of skunks crosses the path of the heroes, and the young Gnome sister gleefully rushes forward to make friends with the cuties. Using the gnomish ability to speak with small animals she brings them into the fold where they can keep warm during the cold weather. They react well to everyone save the poor ranger, who narrowly avoids getting sprayed after spooking one. Laughter all around the table. The gnomes are able to glean from the skunks that a large predatory 'bird, not bird' is hunting in the area.The old grandmother told the heroes that bandits often use an old nearby military training facility and watchtower as a hideout, so it's possible her grandson was taken there. The group immediately heads in that direction. On the way in, about 100 yards from the front gate they find a body, discoloured and pierced. A dead warrior armed with a strange, collapsible pike, sectioned in 5 ft lengths. The ranger grabs the pike to take a look at it. They don't search the body further yet, feeling time was of the essence, so aside from the pike they take nothing else, but move closer.As they near, something large moving catches the eye of the Ranger. Knowing that a large flying creature is hunting in the area, they immediately move into a copse of woods to take cover and watch from safety. A massive, two-legged, winged beast with a long tail (with stinger) occasionally flies up from the top of the watchtower and returns with some large game. Correctly assessing that it's a wyvern, the group makes a plan.They will wait for it to fly out to hunt again and use that time to approach the compound and get inside where they can attempt to ambush it from within. When the creature flies off, they sprint for the watchtower. The front gate is locked, albeit damaged and rusted. The Gnome brother attempts to pick the lock, but is unable to move the rusted tumblers, the attempt taking 3 rounds. The Gnome sister tries, her attempt taking 4 rounds... but the wyvern's screech alerts the group after she's but one round in on her work.The Gnome sister says she will keep working on it if they can hold off the wyvern. The gnome brother casts phantasmal force to create and illusion of a prancing buck, hoping to distract the beast with a tastier target. The Ranger, having assembled the pike, stands in a protective centre spot and sets it against the creature should it swoop in. Feltuun the dwarf readies a bullet in his sling.The wyvern soars around and flies in from the flank. Feltuun misses with a sling bullet, while the Gnome brother moves the prancing buck between the group and the attacking creature... alas the wyvern has its sights set on the tasty gnome. Dive attack... BUT... Arash the Ranger has the pike ready and despite being non-proficient, scores a key hit with a natural 20! The pike keeps the wyvern at bay disrupting its charge.The gnome sister is almost done, 1 more round and they will see if the door is opened. (they don't know the roll result yet until the time has fully passed. Feltuun misses with another bullet, the gnome brother maintains his concentration on the phantasmal buck.New round The wyvern is flapping its wings in front of them, but decides the yummy looking deer is probably an easier meal than the pesky humanoids, and goes for it. Two successful strikes dispelling the trick and distracting it long enough for the gnome sister to complete her work and with a successful roll to opens the gate! in the subsequent round the group opts to retreat into the building, only poor Feltuun is a little too slow to slip in before the wyvern can attempt and attack. Both attacks miss!With its snack hidding inside the building the wyvern flies around, eventually returning to its perch. The group hears sobbing in an adjacent room, discovers the kidnapped boy, huddled in moldy blankets. He explains that the bad men took him to be a cup boy, but the beast attacked and one of the men who wasn't so bad brought him here for cover before going back out to try and kill it - he didn't know this was its nest. The boy's food has run out and he's too scared to leave.The group forms a plan to use the gnome sister's memorized phantasmal force to create another bit of bait, lure the wyvern out in the open and bombard it at range. The plan works in luring it down, but rolls don't go their way as most shots miss... save one lucky shot from the ranger succeeding in just enough damage to ground it! The wound to its wing forces it to land, and Feltuun's chaotic bloodthirst drives him to charge in full tilt to melee it, hoping to finish it off. Alas, the charge is unsuccessful, and the wyvern scores a hit on him with the dreaded stinger! Feltuun's CON is 16, however, and that gives dwarves a +4 to save vs poison... Feltuun makes the save and continues the fight.The gnome sister's last remaining spell is colour spray, but being a lower level than the wyvern all she can hope is for a minor stun, still better than nothing! The wyvern fails the save! Stunned for but a few segments, it's still long enough for Feltuun to score a blow! Recovering from the stun, the wyvern's morale fails and it flees on foot, running humourously on its two likes like a scared chicken! It uses its claws to scramble up the tower to its nest. The group plans to finish it off by climbing the stairs on the inside and attacking. Sending the ranger forward alone to maximize his stealth, they wait. He gets the drop and peppers with arrows from a position of cover on the staircase, and in the subsequent round Feltuun rushes in to finish it with his axe. They learn that it was a momma wyvern protecting a little one... but such creatures are too dangerous to live, so they dispatch it as well... but not before it scores a stinger it on poor Feltuun... dwarven resilience to poison saves the day again!Some loot is found in the Wyvern's nest as well as in the abandoned watchtower. They return the boy to his grandmother, as well as leaving them with enough coin to set them up for a while, and the party returns home triumphant.Levels are made, training is paid for, and a good time is had by all.Regulars:Feltuun, Dwarven fighter. Now level 5.Arash, Human Ranger, now level 3.Guests:Gnorm the Gnome brother. Illusionist/thief. (Guest player, new to my table)Gnorma the Gnome sister. Illusionist/thief. (Guest player for this group, is a regular in my 1e spinoff group)Absent:Kyla, Human Kensai, lvl 3.Name TBD, 1st level Human Druid.</blockquote>

Verification