Story Hour - Keep on the Shadowfell with first time D&D players

[zoroaster100]

The cast of characters in the six player party:

Lilith the Half-Elven - Fey-pact warlock female half-elf, daughter of elven knight Sir Keegan Redleaf and a human woman from Winterhaven. Lilith was raised by adoptive human parents in Winterhaven until her family was expelled from town after she was accused of killing a boy with witchcraft.

Lozol the Half-Elven - Lilith's brother, and son of Keegan Redleaf. Lozol is a half elf paladin of Bahamut. He was separted from Lilith at birth and was raised by the Wood Singer elven tribe near Winterhaven until he learned that his father had been a paladin of Bahamut that served under the Nerathian emperor. He then traveled to the mountain fortress of the last remaining dragonborn clan to learn the ways of paladinhood and the worship of Bahamut.

Tlaloc - elf rogue - Tlaloc is an elf, but he is so short and slight that he is often confused for a human child or a halfling. As a child in the Wood Singer's elven village he was often teased. He became fast friends with Lozol when Lozol stopped another elf child from bullying Tlaloc. Tlaloc gave himself his adult name after it came to him in a dream during his Manhood Hunt (the elf tribe's ritual for a child to become an adult by hunting alone in the wild for a week).

Xandir Moonstar - eladrin wizard - Xandir was sent by the High Magus of the Eladrin with a powerful ritual scroll to find the long-sundered half-elven siblings born of the Wood Singer elven tribe. A prophesy has been uttered which suggests that there is a great Darkness approaching which may threaten the Middle World, and these siblings may provide a clue to how to stop the Darkness.

Rafanel Starhawk - elf ranger - Rafanel is the most promising new warrior of the Wood Singer tribe. But he already bears a great burden because he failed to save his promised love from an assault by gnolls on his tribe several years past. He was all too eager to accept the elven lord's charge to travel with the strange eladrin wizard to fulfill a great quest, departing from the home that now carry too many sad memories for him.

Hyksos - dragonborn warlord - Hyksos grew up in the dragonborn Order of the East Wind, learning the ways of Bahamut. He has grown tired of endless waiting and guarding against the unseen threat of evil dragonkind, which his kind is devoted to, and wants to do something to prove to humanity that dragonborn are worthy allies against the evil forces of the world. He heard the Lord of Winterhaven is looking for mercenaries to wipe out the kobold threat to the town, and this seems like a great opportunity to prove himself and to attack the hated kobolds, whom his kind see as mockeries of the glory of the dragonborn.

 

[zoroaster100]

Intro and A Cryptic Prophesy of Doom

The World Needs Heroes

The World is no longer what it once was. As little as a century ago, the mighty empire of Nerath held sway over all the known lands. Eladrin oracles were welcomed by human sages in Nerath’s centers of learning. Halfling wanderers were greeted with joy in every town. Dwarven merchants from Hammerfast Hold were met with anticipation when they brought their mastercraft jewels and ornaments to market. The elves were given autonomous guardianship of the woods and wild places. The few remaining dragonborn clans bound themselves to serve the Nerathian Emperor, forming a holy order in service to the Platinum Dragon, their deity and creator. The dragonborn Order of the East Wind swore to keep a watchful eye against the threat of evil dragonkind.

Indeed, those were glorious times. But the empire of Nerath is no more. Like the tiefling empire of Bael-Turath that came before it, Nerath collapsed after a decades-long struggle against its adversaries. Now ruins of the once-great Nerathian empire lie like shipwrecks in the hills, grim reminders of Nerath’s shattered dream of peace and prosperity.

In more recent times, the elves have become largely isolationist, forbidding entry to their sacred groves and forests to all other races except their sundered brethren, the eladrin. The eladrin have in turn largely withdrawn from the Middle World, consumed by their own problems in the Fey world.

The dragonborn are nearly extinct, and the remnants of their once-proud race now hire themselves out as mercenaries, while their leaders continue to keep an ever more hopeless guard against the growing influence of evil dragons.

Humans live in mostly small villages and towns, increasingly isolated from each other by the danger of all manner of bandits and brigands who prey on unwary travelers, including kobolds, goblins, orcs and worse monsters (and maybe the very worst of all, depraved humans who have embraced cruel and barbarous ways). Civilization has been reduced to a few fading points of light in a growing sea of dark. The World is in need of heroes to keep the last remaining points of light from being snuffed out.

A Cryptic Prophecy of Doom

In these already dark times, a dark prophesy of doom was received by the eladrin. Upon receiving a nightmare vision of the future too dreadful to speak of, the eladrin High Oracle, Beliritha the Chosen, screamed and screamed until she died of horror. The eladrin Lesser Oracles consulted among themselves, and decided to ask the High Magus of the Starfire Court to send an agent to the Middle World to seek an explanation for the cryptic prophecy and to learn what trouble might be brewing amongst the mortal races of the World.

But the High Magus is apparently too consumed by his own machinations and plots within the eladrin Queen’s court. Queen Mirian Starfire’s monarchy is threatened by a challenger within her own clan, and the eladrin are abuzz with competing plots to support her or to undermine her rule. Still, the Oracles cannot be altogether ignored. So the High Magus sent his Least Apprentice, Xandir Starmoon, into the dangerous Middle World, armed only with a beginner’s spellbook, a sword, and a scroll for a single divination ritual. And to guide him, Xandir has only the Oracles’ vague warnings, and a cryptic prediction about half-elves whose fate is somehow bound up with a coming Darkness.

 

[zoroaster100]

The Quest Begins

On arriving in the Middle World, Xandir first turned for aid to the eladrin’s brethren, the Wood Singer elves of Westdeep Forest. Hearing of the prophesy, the elven lord of the Wood Singers determined that the time has come to find and unite Lozol and Lilith, the long sundered half-elven children of Sir Keegan Redleaf (a renowned elven paladin knight of Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon). The elven lord assigned the Wood Singers’ most promising new warrior, Rafanel Starhawk, as well as Lozol’s childhood friend, Tlaloc, to assist the eladrin wizard in his quest. Also joining them was Lozol’s dragonborn friend, Hyksos. Hyksos is on his own quest to wipe out the kobold threat to the human lands, in order to prove to the humans that dragonborn are still worthy friends and allies.

The questing heroes headed towards the human town of Winterhaven. A half day from town they encountered none other than Lilith herself on the Old King’s Road. She was on her way to her adoptive mother’s home, to help her mother find Lilith’s adoptive father, the scholar Douvan Staul.

They began a conversation with Lilith, to convince her that they sought her for a worthy purpose. But then the elves' acute hearing detected a man running over the next hill towards the group. A farmhand rushed up the road, white as a sheet from fear. It took some convincing to get the man to overcome his fear of the “giant dragon man”, Hyksos. But after getting the farmhand’s story that his brother had been captured by "hundreds" of small dragon men. , Rafanel and Tlaloc decided to scout ahead.

Coming over the hill stealthily, the elves spotted the Staul farmstead under attack by kobold brigands. The feral little scaled monsters barked and skittered about, poking and harassing a barely conscious human farmhand they had captured. Meanwhile, other kobolds busied themselves setting fire to the farmstead. Rafanel, enraged to see bandits assaulting helpless people, recalling the cruelty of the gnoll barbarians who years ago slaughtered so many of his own tribe, signaled to Tlaloc to get help, but decided not to wait to start the attack. From cover of tree foliage, Rafanel began a barrage of arrows that killed two kobold minions before they knew what hit them. Meanwhile, Tlaloc returned swiftly to the rest of the group to bring reinforcements.

Soon, the entire group was locked in combat with the kobolds. Hyksos, the dragonborn, charged fearlessly headlong into the fray, cutting down a kobold minion with his longsword. Unfortunately, he now found himself exposed to the horde of kobolds out in the open. Given courage by their apparent overwhelming numerical advantage, the kobolds barked and squealed with anticipation of killing their hated enemy, a dragonborn. Quickly, Hyksos found himself surrounded. He was soon the target for a kobold slinger and several minion javelin throwers. But worse, from behind the farmstead, two previously hidden kobold dragonshield soldiers charged at Hyksos, wearing scale armor and dragonscale shields. With them came even more kobold minions swarming up to attack.

Things were looking grim for the dragonborn, but then the rest of the group launched into action. Xandir the wizard and Lilith the warlock sorceress both launched fiery magical blasts at the kobolds, weakening and making them vulnerable to well placed blows from the others. Hyksos restored himself from the brink of death with his own inspirational words, steeling himself to fight on against his enemies. Tlaloc used a blinding barrage of daggers to slay his foes in numbers. Xandir slowed some kobolds with a sleep spell, while Rafanel, Tlaloc and Lilith took down one after another foe with missiles and magic. Finally, the battle was won, and the last kobold tried to flee.

Xandir used a well placed magic missile to knock the last kobold unconscious for questioning. Fortunately the dragonborn spoke the Draconic language of the kobolds, and his skill at intimidation served him well in the interrogation. The kobold revealed that his tribe had been conquered and enslaved into service by a fearsome goblin overlord, calling himself Irontooth, who in turn seems to serve a greater master. But the kobold would not reveal the location of the tribe’s lair despite severe intimidation, as apparently, it feared Irontooth even more than anything the heroes might do to it.

Before the interrogation could be completed, the heroes realized that the farmstead had indeed been set on fire by the kobolds, presenting the heroes with a tremendous challenge to their skills to avoid having the farm burn down completely. Xandir used an ice spell to freeze a portion of the roof to slow the fire, and Hyksos used his frosty dragon breath to help put out the fire. But to finish the job also required raw strength to carry buckets of water to put out the fire, and magical help in the form of Xandir’s mage hand spell, which created a disembodied floating hand to carry buckets of water to dump on the roof.

After defeating the kobolds and putting out the house fire, the heroes spoke to Mrs. Staul and learned that the last time she saw her husband was when Douvan went to Winterhaven to speak looking for the location of a reputed dragon burial site. The heroes decided to rest at the Staul farmstead. They knew the next day they would have to go to Winterhaven to track down Douven Staul. And surely the path to the missing scholar would also lead to even greater danger.

 

[zoroaster100]

Down Time In Winterhaven

The town of Winterhaven was founded over two hundred years ago, under the protection of the Emperor (before the fall of the Empire of Nerath). At one point, Nerath’s soldiers kept watch over the town from Shadow Keep, a fortress built on the nearby foothills. Shadow Keep is now in ruins, and the King’s Road is quite deteriorated from lack of maintenance, but still the town clings to survival.

When our group of heroes visited Winterhaven, they found a picturesque, sleepy little walled village. The guards at the town gate eyed the dragonborn and elves suspiciously, but allowed them to pass unmolested into town. The town was pretty quite in the morning, but some farmers busied themselves unloading their vegetables and chickens to sell in the open air market. Hyksos the dragonborn stopped to talk to an elven girl selling wild flowers from a cart at the market, and even bought some flowers from her. It was lucky he struck up conversation with her, as it turned out that the flower girl, Delphina Moongem, sometimes ventures up the foothills and into the woods searching for wild flowers. She warned Hyksos that the Shadow Keep is now inhabited by goblins, and that the kobold brigands seem to live somewhere near the waterfall in the woods not far from town.

The heroes bought supplies from the town’s dwarven blacksmith, Thair Coalstriker, who bitterly complained about the new “Grande Shoppe”, and its proprietor, Bairwin Wildarson, who used to buy many shovels and picks from the dwarf, but now only steals away his customers.

The heroes then visited Wrafton’s Inn. They were greeted by the friendly innkeeper, Salvana Wrafton, and questioned Eilian the Old, to ask the grizzled old farmer for the whereabouts of Lilith’s father, Douvan. The group learned that Douvan obtained the directions to the dragon burial site from Eilian the Old. Eilian happily offered to draw them a map so they could follow in Douvan’s footsteps.

Before leaving town, however, the heroes visited the tower of the sage, Valthrun the Prescient, and learned a little bit more about the divination scroll carried by Xandir the wizard. The group also visited Lord Padraig, the town’s leader, who offered (after some negotiation) to pay them one hundred twenty-five gold pieces for ridding the town of the threat of the kobold brigands.

 

[zoroaster100]

Trust Gnome One

After resting at the Inn, the group set out for the dragon burial site. A few hours later, after traveling through the green hills and meadows southwest of Winterhaven, the heroes arrived at a large crater of bare rock dug into the wilderness. A friendly, giggly voice greeted them from within the crater. “You can’t fully appreciate what we’ve uncovered from up above. Come down toward the dragon bones and see what the workers have discovered” said a small grey gnome standing at the bottom of the hole. The gnome tried to persuade them to come down the crater to have a closer look. But the heroes sensed something was amiss, and refused to go down to the gnome.

Finally, the “friendly” gnome’s patience ended. “Oh, well. Kill them all,” was how he finished their conversation. The gnome’s four human workers, armed with clubs, started to rush at the heroes. The gnome’s halfling lackey, armed with a sling, began to circle the crater to get into position to attack with his sling. The gnome also unleashed his guardian drakes - strong, heavy lizard creatures eager to tear their claws and jaws into the gnome’s enemies. Then the gnome, Agrid, used his gnomish stealth to hide himself with illusion, and his halfling lackey hid himself as well.

The guard drakes rushed up a slope out of the crater, rushing headlong at Tlaloc with slavering jaws. Tlaloc soon found himself assaulted by the drakes. The beasts ruthlessly tore into him with tooth and claw. The human rabble swarmed out of the crater as well, swinging their clubs madly. Meanwhile, the halfling slid around the crater in stealth and began to aim well placed sling shots at the heroes.

But now it was the heroes’ turn to respond. Lilith used her spells to blast at the drakes and the humans, and used her vampiric embrace to drain the life force from one drake in order to strengthen herself. Hyksos charged up to fight alongside Tlaloc, stabbing and slicing at the drakes with his sword and blocking their bites with his shield. Xandir summoned a huge flaming sphere right behind the drakes. The sphere scorched the reptiles from behind, trapping them between Hyksos’ and Tlaloc’s steel blades and a roaring inferno of heat. The drakes succumbed to the heat and to the repeated blows from the warriors.

Xandir then began to mentally move his conjured flaming sphere about the battlefield, scorching every foe that got too close. The ranger’s bow, spellcasters’ incantations, and Tlaloc’s well aimed daggers soon were focused on the gnome. But whenever the gnome was hit, he would cackle with scorn and vanish from sight, becoming invisible. Finally, Rafanel, Tlaloc and Lilith decided to end that charade. When the gnome next disappeared, Lilith blasted him and Tlaloc hurled a dagger at him, and Rafanel shot at the spot where the gnome had been standing. As if from thin air, the heroes heard the cry of the gnome as the fey critter was pierced by Rafanel’s arrow where he stood invisible. Agrid the gnome appeared out of his invisibility, clutching his bloody chest, pierced by an arrow, and keeled over dead.

The halfling slinger turned to run, but could not escape the careful aim of Xandir’s magic missiles and Rafanel’s arrows.

The heroes quickly searched through their fallen foes. The gnome was found wearing Douven’s golden amulet, which inside bore a tiny portrait of Lilith’s mother. Some gold and silver coins were also discovered. But best of all, under a blanket, the heroes found not only Douven, still alive, but also Lilith’s missing brother, Lozol, who apparently was captured by the evil gnome while looking for the family he has just recently learned about. Lilith’s father, in gratitude for the rescue from the evil gnome, offers his amulet as a reward to the group of heroes. But Douven also pleads with the group, especially with his daughter Lilith, to try to correct Douven’s own failure by recovering the scrolls the gnome stole from the burial site. Douven tells the heroes that, on threat of torture, he helped the gnome find a secret tomb at this burial site, and discover a hidden set of buried scrolls. The gnome already delivered the scrolls to some kobolds that visited the burial site a few days ago. The kobolds came to collect the scrolls on behalf of their leader, Irontooth. Douven fears that by helping the gnome and his kobold allies obtain the scrolls, Douven may have done great harm.

Finally, Douvan tells the heroes there is also another relic in the tomb beside the scrolls which were already taken. After the gnome got the scrolls, he had Douven use his knowledge and skills as a scholar and archaologist to help the gnome locate and discover this second item. That second item has not yet been fully dug up, however, and remains in the tomb below. It lies in a sarcophagus, in the tunnel down the mine shaft at the bottom of the burial site crater. “Let’s go down there and open the sarcophagus”, says Douvan, “Agrid was so eager to find it and dig it up. I can’t wait to see what’s inside!”

 

[zoroaster100]

We play our second session on Saturday! I'm very excited to see how the new players will do on their second time playing. They had a good time last time and have talked about the game several times since the first session two weeks ago. They've taken to calling Tlaloc "TClk, TClk" like the clucking sound used by the Bushmen in their language. And the other players have accused the player of that character of creating a halfling, but calling him an elf. They have all confirmed back for the second session.

One player, one that plays the paladin, could not make it for the first session due to a last minute family emergency. He will be there this time, so it will be interesting to see how they do with six characters rather than five. I may have to buff up some of the encounters.

 

[zoroaster100]

Down Time In Winterhaven

Double Post

 

[zoroaster100]

Trust Gnome One

Double post

 

[Caldarion]

Very good Zoroaster. I'm really enjoying this! Keep those updates comin!!

 

[zoroaster100]

Thanks for the feedback, Caldarion. I've already written up the journal entries from the second session. We had the player of the half-elf paladin play this time, so we had a full complement of six players. We had a great time in our second session. The last battle was massive (against Irontooth and A LOT of kobolds), but no one wanted to stop part way through the battle, so the session went an hour overtime. It was a lot of fun. I'll be posting an update later tonight when I get home.