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

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="jasper" data-source="post: 7246844" data-attributes="member: 277">Steading of the Hill Giant session 1 and 2. Warning Warning Warning. The map was not update to reflect the size of giants. The scale is 1 square equal 10 feet. I would go with 1 square equal 20 feet. Especially if you play with tactical players. I had one who wanted to lock down the hallways when he discovered the map in 10 A. I told my players I would resize the map as I thought was necessary. I am also using the original map from the 1E adventure. Look at the map on 168. room 5 does not have a door. I also made a goody bag.  I typed up the contents of the chart on page 166, it took up a page. Then print out a sheet for about every 3 giants in the series. I also add some surprises. Like one free reroll. I cut the sheets and placed in a bag. Every time they loot a giant they roll 2d4 and pull that many sheets of paper.Session 1 only had 4 players but were an average group. Due to the party going on the group was able to get away with a lot of combat. So there a lot of gimme to the groups. The party wipe out the two sleeping guards easily. Then sneak up the west hallway to 19. They bypassed the kitchen and great hall. Room 19 was fun, they shut down the hill giant trying to pick up girls by turning him into a map and then wiped the floor of the females. The normal tactics were silence and darkness in the rooms. (Note due to party going on in the main hall this really does not matter).The dog pen  room 22 was laugh. The druid did not read his syllabus. He sees the number dogs and says he could handle them by himself. SO the group closes the door behind him. OOPPPS. The player forgot he did not get the ability he was going to use for a couple of levels. But a reverse gravity spell and bad die rolls helped. This is where my dice went back to normal. Lately I generally either roll high or low all the time during the night. The dice on everyone was all over the map.The druid befriend on of the dire wolves and group explore the eastern side of the strong hold destroying empty rooms as they went. They killed mama bear in room 7.They knew giants were in room 5, ready some spells and knocked.When granny with her fluffy pillows open the door they shot gun her in the face, she was able to hit one pc with her pillow she was holding. ( I did rock damage). Then before the round was out she was dead. I did a rule of cool. Any one touching the base of her mini did a dex save. Two pcs failed and were getting crushed under the dead old grand mother giant. Telekinesis got the dead body off the pcs and opened the doorway. And that quickly ended the combat. So they decided to take a SHORT REST. IN the Maid's Chamber. NEXT TO PARTY CENTRAL. They did hide in a tidy hut. But bad luck a wandering monster check had some of their handy work discovered. I put 5 minutes on the timer to decide what the giants would do. And started shifting encounters. They hit the barracks after the short rest. They were not too concerned that the dead bodies were removed from the maid chamber.  They were not too concerned that the noise level of the party was down.They had a map.They had a plan.They all turned invisible.They were cocky.They opened the secret door to the great hall.....,,,,\......The dm told them to draw out the map adding 20 feet to each side. Then told them to leave the table and not look.It took me about 10 minutes to set out the minis, the cardboard tokens, and label each piece.I did enjoy the look on their faces when they saw the hall. I moved the kids in from 3, the hill giant from 2, and spread them out.Most of them wanted to run. And I did not roll get above an 8 on the initiative. The druid threw reverse gravity again. And again my dice loved the party. Not one save in the AOE.  I forgot the second spell the party threw but not much damage. They were smiling. They had this.Until.The cloud giant did misty step into the hallway.  They did little damage to the cloud giant and I forgot the magic weapon. But the next time the cloud giant swung the sorcerer was zeroed out.  And the giants were using the ceiling to try to move out of AOE.The Warlock grabbed the down sorcerer and dimension door out. Leaving two pcs to run away on foot. To the front door where they found out it was barred. The druid casted insect swarm  which gave disadvantage to all attacks. Which was good because before they escaped I was wasted 7 nat 20s on the pcs. They were trapped behind a wall of fire which was burning the door and giants. Dice hate me. After 4 or 5 attempts to open the barred door (athletics 20) the druid with a -1 to str rolled a nat 20 and they escaped with I think both of them being under 15 hp each.Dead full hill giants 4, Ogre level giants 9, Wolfs 13. Bear 1. No dead pcs. The second session on Sunday was 3 person party weak group but lowest pc was 14th level.I spent time thinking on what they giants would do and how they change the lay out. So since they didn't kill any one in the party hall, I piece meal them out to various locations. The dead giants were buried north of the fort.The party snuck into the dog pen taking out the 4 giants there.  They took the guards in the west hall way in front the grand hall with no problem. Then proceed to murder the kitchen staff.  Since the orcs fled north and south part parts of the fort were alerted. I did a rule of cool again and the orcs fleeing north trampled some of the pcs for a little damage.I had placed the Cloud and Stone giant in room 14. When they heard of pcs fight they tired to flee. The pcs gave chase and combat took awhile.I let the group decide rule of cool in which the cloud giant escapes and stone giant dead, or continue the combat. They choose cool. So the druid got impaled by a burning heat metal magical great sword. Giants dead 4, ogres 7. So now I have to decide on how to rearrange the map again. I do have the monsters holding their magical stuff instead what is locked up or hidden on the first floor.edit to add.I gave the players two story awards. The murders of granny will have all full hill giants roll at advantage on them. The ones who stole the cloud giants great sword will have all cloud giants roll with advantage on the pcs.</blockquote>

Verification