World's Largest Dungeon in actual play [Spoilers!]

[erucsbo]

So... the Frost Giant leader will let the party exit in exchange for "their most powerful magic items and an oath of fealty".

I'm a little confused by that last bit as to what it would mean. It seems like they become vassels of him and he becomes their 'lord'. He can then command them to do whatever he wants? (Within a Lord - Vassel relationship anyway). So he could make them stay in the WLD and work for him or go out into the world and bring him back treasure, magic items, supplies?

I'm thinking of making it "your most powerful magic items and serve me for a year". Same idea without the hassle of dealing with interupiting what the oath means. And the party would be sure to say 'no' to another year inside the Dungeon.

I think the party will meet up with him tonight... if a fight breaks out its going to be ugly.

rv

seems odd for them to agree to the terms required to "exit" if they don't get to exit.
fealty often means answering a call to arms, paying tribute/taxes, or agreeing to some other terms of service in exchange for protection.

If you are wanting to extend things past WLD for the characters then have the fealty mean delivering a message to some Frost Giant overlord (or may even be an ancient White Dragon), or destroy a Fire Giant King or Red Dragon outside the WLD or some other hook for a higher level adventure that is outside the WLD that would directly benefit the Frost Giants (and may be detrimental to humans and other goodly folk)

 

[rvalle]

seems odd for them to agree to the terms required to "exit" if they don't get to exit.
fealty often means answering a call to arms, paying tribute/taxes, or agreeing to some other terms of service in exchange for protection.

If you are wanting to extend things past WLD for the characters then have the fealty mean delivering a message to some Frost Giant overlord (or may even be an ancient White Dragon), or destroy a Fire Giant King or Red Dragon outside the WLD or some other hook for a higher level adventure that is outside the WLD that would directly benefit the Frost Giants (and may be detrimental to humans and other goodly folk)

Thanks for the ideas.

As the party is all 'good' they didn't like the idea of serving an evil Frost Giant very much. I tossed out the 'for a year' bit and it didn't go over so well.

So then the party tried to theaten their way past. The Frost Giant leader has a slave brought out and drops a Power Word Kill onto her as a 'show of power' (i.e Look at me I can cast 9th level spells!' and claims to have more of those where they came from (he does). The party takes the slaying of the slave very badly and an inviso mage drops an Acid Fog onto the leader an some of his minions. The battle restarts (it had paused when the leader ran in from the back of the cave yelling to halt the battle) and the party flees dropping Walls of Force behind them and D-dooring/flying away.

So, the party now knows the way out and that it is guarded by a high level Frost Giant caster (he said he was guarding the exit and they could smell the fresh air coming down the hallway... so close yet so far!). They figure they will stay in and clean up some loss ends while trying to gather enough power to fight their way though.


I doubt I'll run anything else with these characters once they get out of the WLD. I might take the undead region and run it as a stand-alone. I'll probably try to get the group to try Savage Worlds and run their Evernight campaign.

rv

 

[erucsbo]

Pyrefaust

Last session for the year so this ended up a little rushed, but nevertheless climactic.
Had the region's lantern archon appear and tell the party that the leader of the Azers was going to perform a ritual that would result in the dragon being freed. This prompted them to action. Buffed with Heroisms, stoneskins, fire resistance etc, the party headed in to the Azers area, in to the mine. The intention was to try and bypass the Azers as much as possible and find Teer'Kaal.
The paladin was going to do a rushed diplomacy check when it was found out that this was a full-round action, and thus she could not move, and do it, so intimidate was used instead (first time intimidate had been used in the campaign successfully). She followed this up with a rushed Diplomacy the next round and got 25 (after the -10 penalty) and pushed the reaction from unfriendly to friendly, and therefore were able to get from the Azers directions to get to Teer'Kaal. 2 secret doors later and they found themselves in the big room with the dragon statue, the kneeling Azers and Teer'Kaal starting the ritual.
Wall of Force was used to cut off half the Azers, and with Teer'Kaal busy with the ritual the mooks were sword fodder. The party had been hasted, rogues invisible, and prayer was running. The Fighter, Eldritch Knight and paladin used cleave to great effect, mowing down azers and then closed on Teer'Kaal in about 3 rounds - WAY short of the 15 rounds the ritual is supposed to take.
We were about out of time, so I had the ritual start to take effect with flames developing along Teer'Kaal's body, he dropped a delayed blast fireball (with energy resistance and evasion the party suffered very little) and the paladin got a critical on a smite, doing 60hp damage, then another 50hp with her second shot. I had Teer'Kaal explode with the force of another huge fireball - but evasion and fire resistance also limited the damage to the party, and we were done.
Characters will level up (most to 11th) and reforge weapons and deal with the giants offline, but I'm not sure if they will press through to the other areas of the Pyrefaust when we resume again.
We'll probably try and run a single session 1ed game over the Christmas / NY break before once again picking up where we left off.

Advice sought - Wall of Force (from the sorcerer) being used to change combat conditions is now becoming de rigeur, as is haste (for the extra attack as much as the movement benefit). Has anyone encountered these tactics being overly employed, and if so were you able to mitigate them?

 

[raynbow]

Pyrefaust

Advice sought - Wall of Force (from the sorcerer) being used to change combat conditions is now becoming de rigeur, as is haste (for the extra attack as much as the movement benefit). Has anyone encountered these tactics being overly employed, and if so were you able to mitigate them?

Wall of Force I don't see that much but haste... I don't know if 'overused' is exactly the right word, more "standard operating procedure".

There are just alot of spells like that on these higher level parties. I don't have the problem as my GM in my WLD game yet, because my players are still low. But, I'm a player in another game at higher levels, and I doubt there is a single person in that group that has less than 4 active spells on them at any one time, and that's before we even get into combat.

Using haste, and other great buffing spells is a legitimate tactic, and I don't know if you really want to spend any more time trying to "mitigate" it than you do any other tactic. The best thing to do is just to be AWARE of it, as well as any other standard operating procedures your group has.

If a fight looks like it's going to be a cakewalk (or impossible) because of their SOP's, you can think about adjusting it.

You might also just think about having your NPC's use similar tactics. Take away some of their silly/worthless spells and give them buffs as well, or give them counters to the most popular buffs. Their's no reason, in most cases, to assume the NPC's aren't just as smart and experienced at combat strategies as their PC counterparts.

 

[rvalle]

My group (13th) has been casting Haste about every fight for a while now. There are 2 characters that have the spell.

Wall of Force is new but has started to show up as either being cast or as an option for the last few fights. They used it last game as a 'Oh shoot, we need to run away NOW' sort of thing. WoF between them and the bad guys and run. I suspect I'll be seeing more and more of this sort of thing as we move forward.

Others that have started to pop up their heads: Blade Barriers as battle field control and their newest trick: Acid Fog with a Blade Barrier around it. Or though it and just how does a Large creature that can only move '5 get out of the way of a Blade Barrier? Bleh.

rv

 

[Dracorat]

I wouldn't worry much about Wall of Force. Remember that the enemies usually know their small part of the dungeon better than the players. Have them run through adjacent rooms to catch the fleeing players. Have them bring those rooms with them...

 

[rvalle]

One thing to remember, the Wall of Force is 10 feet high and, at least Frost Giants, are 15 feet tall.

rv

 

[erucsbo]

One thing to remember, the Wall of Force is 10 feet high and, at least Frost Giants, are 15 feet tall.

rv

unless the mage makes it 20' high (or higher) [Effect = Wall whose area is up to one 10-ft. square/level]
Usually they save it for running away, but the last few times it has been SOP to divide and conquer.

Thanks for the tip on blade barrier.

 

[erucsbo]

Happy New Year everyone.
I wonder if I can squeeze another whole year of gaming out of WLD?

 

[DaveMage]

Happy New Year everyone.
I wonder if I can squeeze another whole year of gaming out of WLD?

Happy new year!


(And I'm sure you could get another year's worth out of the WLD. )