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Message: <blockquote data-quote="RealAlHazred" data-source="post: 6722541" data-attributes="member: 25818">Originally posted by worrgrendel1:I really loved this mini adventure and decided to use it in my campaign. I am currently running Hoard of the Dragon Queen (WARNING!! Might be some spoilers with HoTDQ and RoT) with a mixture of new and veteren D&D players and inserted this at the point in the campaign where the adventurers head to Baldur's Gate to intercept the wagon train and join the caravan going north. I really felt like there was a lot of missed potential for adventure in Baldur's Gate while the party waited for the wagon train to arrive and this fit in quite nicely. I modified it only a little bit to fit more with being in Baldur's Gate than Eberron and changed the"prize" at the end to a something not quite what the players were expecting. A little history on the party/campaign. 6 players: Human Hunter Ranger (archer) literally modeled after Oliver Queen from the Arrow TV series. This character's backstory was with father being prominent merchant in BG who got mixed up with the Cult of the Dragon to fund his merchant business. Was on merchant ship with father when ship was sabotaged by CoD and went down. Lost on deserted island and trained into weapon to avenge father and bring down the cult. Zhentarim contacts in BG set up the mini adventure. Dwarf Life Cleric. Sailor and great, great grandfather was renowned dragon slayer. This backstory will come up later in RoT when dealing with good dragons (ancestor wasn't picky about slaying good/evil dragons). Human Open Hand Monk. Gladiator from GB. Relative captured by CoD in raid. Rescued in early part of campaign and staying with party to see it through. First time D&D player and catching on quickly. Dragonborn Vengence Paladin of Bahamut. Actually an ancient gold dragon who got a little to prideful and Bahamut turned him into a Gold Dragonborn to learn a little humility. Bahamut pointed him in the direction of the CoD. Amazing roleplaying from this character so far while he is perceiving the world (and the people in it) from the perspective of a dragon really well. His background will also come up big later in RoT with the council of good dragons. Elf Assassin Rogue. Noble background. Distantly related to King Melandrach and his son Neronvain. Was actually framed for a crime by Neronvain and fled vowing vengence. His backstory will come up big in RoT when dealing with Melandrach and Neronvain. Also a first time player and doing very well. Gnome Illusionist Wizard. Spy background. Was recruited by Leonsin of the Harpers to spy on the CoD. Infiltrated their ranks in BG and learned of attack on Greenest. Maintained cover so far with CoD and the party. On with the adventure! I decided to use the Oliver Queen back story and ran with it. The vault was set up under an illegal casino run by the nefarious dwarf crime lord only known as "Brick" who is obsessed with his clan history with the manticores and dwarf history in general. His right hand man is Colonel Clank. No one really knows exactly what he is and where is is from but he is utterly loyal to Brick. A mysterious individual known as the Dark Archer (Eldritch Knight archer) is Brick's personal assassin and helped with much of the magical protections in the vault. The characters arrived with plenty of time ahead of the wagon train but knowing how transporting goods through BG occurs and not knowing the final destination they decided to call on the Ranger's Zhentarim connection in BG to watch all the roads/ports in and out of BG and tail the treasure horde for the party in return for a favor. The Zhentarim agent was tasked by an unnamed source to steal something from Brick's vault. Not wanting to risk a turf war and implicate himself in the heist he recruited the party to steal it for him. With some assistance from the agent 2 party members infiltrated the casino as a bouncer and waitress to gather as much intel as possible. The dwarf cleric used his family lineage to buddy up with Brick as well. Through excellent distractions and timely events they managed to get the intel and key they needed for the vault. The race was on! They got into the elevator shaft room with little difficulty and managed to figure out how to operate the lift rather quickly. Down they went. At the bottom, some really good history rolls from the dwarf and some good work by the rogue got them through the east trapped hallway without incident. Once there they decided on an all out frontal assault on the Helmed Horror guardian. The cleric showed some very good out of the box thinking by using a Create Water spell to fill the Helmed Horrors suit of armor up with 10 gallons of water. This was obviously out of the normal realm for the spell but I ruled on the fly that the sudden increase in water and weight would give the Horror disadvantage on attack rolls and dex checks/saves for 1 round. I really like players being creative and felt that rewarding that type of thinking warranted something and I think my ruling felt appropriate. Opinions? It paid off on the Horrors next round of attacks by turning a crit into a miss! The party dispatched the horror with only one party member going down in the fight. They quickly figured out the keys to open the main vault while the party split up trying to open and loot the minor vaults. The session ended with the main vault door opening and finding a human woman chained to the dias in the center of the vault! Surpise! Even better, as they do not know it yet, the woman is actually a Succubus captured by Brick and the Dark Archer. Her patron, a minor devil with some influence is the one who hired the Zhentarim agent to free her from the vault. The devil will owe the party a favor (much to the Paladin's chagrin I can imagine) that can pay off in RoT when the devils faction gets involved. It was actually kind of funny when they found out it was a woman in the vault as one of the players said outload "She's probably a succubus because our DM is an ***hole like that." I think I kept a good poker face for that comment. Thanks again Iserith for the mini adventure! Wont know the full outcome for a while as I'm going on vacation and it will be some time before we get together again to play. I can post then what the party's reaction is when they find out just who they rescued. I also plan on using your Quiet Please! mini adventure as well for the trip on the road to the north. I'm going to have the golden stag be one of Dewey's apprentices who was cursed to wander the land as the golden stag until someone got the knowledge to reverse it from the library. Fun times ahead!</blockquote>

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