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Merric Blackman
Australia
Waubra
Victoria
Ramping up my reviewing.
Happily playing games for many, many years.
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My Greyhawk campaign had been on hiatus for about 7 months, whilst illnesses and overseas trips intervened, so it felt really good to get back to it. Most of the group were now at 11th level, despite Martin trying to insist his druid was 12th level (he'd misread his character sheet, taking the "XP for next level" field for this actual XP.)
Present for this session were the following players and characters:
Adam - Maximillian, a half-elf bard
Nathaniel - Will (junior), a half-elf ranger
Rich - Drakult, a human paladin
Martin - Gillaine, a dwarven druid
When we began this campaign, I was using the Castle Zagyg, Volume 1: Yggsburgh sourcebook for details about the Free City of Greyhawk, along with material I'd developed in previous campaigns, added to old material from The City of Greyhawk. For this session, I brought out the Yggsburgh book again, although as it happened, I just used it as a source of a single name.
The last session of the campaign had seen the characters defeating dark druids and necromancers in the Shadowleaf Forest to the north of the city. As this session began, the characters were feted by the rich and powerful of the city, and a month had passed since that time. I inquired as to what they'd been doing in the meantime, to learn that Will had returned to his university "studies" - mainly dodging study to compete on the university archery team. Max had been going to his usual balls and fetes held by the nobility, Drakult had been praying, and Gillaine had been helping the druids of the local grove, with an eye to become their leader.
I was amenable to this last. Looking up the old AD&D druidic ranks, I discovered that 11th level was an "Initiate of the 9th Circle", the next step being confirmed as a full druid. So, I installed her as the aide to the leader of the circle, whom (after consulting Yggsburgh's list of names) I called Jasper. He'll probably have a deity and a surname, but I'll work them out during the week - indeed, I'm not sure of Gillaine's deity; Martin and Rich haven't played much Greyhawk with me, unlike Adam and Nathaniel, who've been in a lot of my Greyhawk campaigns over the past 10 years.
Adam, Nathaniel and Rich
Now came the difficult bit: discovering what the group wanted to do now. I was hoping to do a bit of city role-playing before diving into the new Tomb of Horrors adventure. As it turned out, none of the players was interested in provoking their own adventure, so I quickly turned to the actual adventure and had to decide what the hook would be to get them in. As it turned out, one of the provided hooks was of caravans being attacked, and I already had a character linked to Max who would be the best person to introduce the plotline with.
So, Myka Traveller, a noble whose wealth came from trading concerns, and who had interacted with the PCs at a ball a month or so ago (in Greyhawk time, alas, several months ago in real time) came asking for help. It didn't take that much persuading for the group to head off... back to the Shadowleaf Forest, where they'd spent so much time recently. Surely they'd gotten rid of the threat of the Necromancers?
In actual fact, they had. And, if Wizards hadn’t released this adventure, that was going to be the last necrotic/fey cross-over they were going to see. However, Tomb of Horrors came galumphing into sight, with its first section being a corrupted garden in the Feywild. Fantastic! Suddenly, a power source for the necromancers of the last adventure was apparent (they’d been tapping into the garden), and their removal had revealed the deeper threat of the Garden of Graves.
Before they set off, I asked the group what supplies they were taking. Well, Adam has a bag of everlasting provisions (PHB, 4th level, uncommon) and Martin has an instant campsite (AV, 5th level, uncommon) which they both got back in the days when I was just letting them buy (create) items from the Compendium. I’m still struggling with exactly what to allow; I told them that they’d still be able to make uncommon items, but they needed to research them first (and let me know in advance so I could work out any special requirements). In any case, between those two items they were well equipped to head into the wilderness.
After most of a day’s journey, they found themselves on the edge of the Shadowleaf Forest where the merchants had been attacked. Following a few tracks into the forest (having a ranger makes tracking very, very easy), they discovered a clearing in which three female corpses were lying. Well, the corrupted dryads wanted them to believe that, but high Perception and Insight scores were too much for that, and they and the harpies that were ready to ambush the party were instead attacked first.
This adventure is written for five 10th level characters. As I instead had four 11th level characters, I thought it a good idea to not bother changing the encounters. They’d be able to handle them! As it turned out, this encounter is unusual: six level 9 opponents, which somehow just remains as a 9th level encounter. For a group of four, it was a 11th level encounter, and it was one that tested the party, with the harpies attacking again and again with thundering screams which were very damaging indeed. Adam was using all of his healing ability to keep his character, Max, upright, whilst Drakult was doing his best to be a defender – which occasionally wasn’t that effective. A paladin can lock down one monster easily enough, but more than that is difficult, especially when the party is outnumbered 6 to 4.
The most troubling thing about their foes was this: when they died, necrotic energy filled them and they continued to fight for another round. A couple of attacks were wasted on already dead opponents, but eventually they were able to properly slay all of the corrupted fey and look around.
Proxy fun: Ghouls are Dryads, Angels are Harpies. Keen-eyed readers may notice a distinct similarity to the miniatures I used in my last two Death’s Reach sessions...
They then discovered a portal, an archway below bended trees woven together. None of the group could use the Analyse Portal ritual, so further than guessing it might lead to the Feywild, they couldn’t tell much more about it. At this point, they decided to head back to town to learn the Close Portal ritual (some digging in the D&D Compendium had revealed its existence), which Max would learn and then they’d use it to banish the threat.
Rather than detailing a random encounter, I said that in a couple more days they reached the portal again and just dealt with the new corrupted creatures that were there. Max performed the ritual, and it worked... briefly. Then the portal came back into existence. Think you’re going to escape the adventure that easily? Not a chance! I revealed to him that there was some force on the other side of the portal creating and maintaining it; he’d have little chance of stopping it from this side.
This, of course, was a challenge to Adam and Nate. Their first instinct was not to go through. Nate shot a lot of arrows through it (anything standing on the other side would now be a pincushion), and the both of them dug a large pit in front of it, so anything stepping through would fall in. With the world now safe from the mysterious portal, they set off home again.
Jasper, head of the druidic grove, was very interested to discover where Gillaine had been without telling him she was leaving. Not surprisingly, he was appalled at what they’d done and quickly ordered Gillaine back: Deal with the portal!
Then Adam and Nate came up with their next “great” idea for dealing with the portal: Hire other adventurers to do it! At a previous point, they’d set up an Adventurer’s Board in their favourite tavern, the Greenleaf Tavern, so they might be able to do exactly that. So they did, and I described the adventuring party that came in response to that call: a dwarf, a large human barbarian, a druid and a bard. Quite similar in a lot of ways to their group. I then revealed the NPCs’ names: Asterix, Obelix, Getafix and Cacafonix.
(Sarah, upon hearing this story later, remarked, “What, no Dogmatix?”)
So, the group led the NPCs to the portal (and pit), and – after a little bit – finally decided to go through themselves. They got the NPCs to fill in the pit, and, after sending them home, finally stepped through the portal.
The portal, indeed, led to the Feywild, and a single path led from it through the dense foliage. The group followed the path and found themselves in front of a great cliff, through which ran a tunnel. Inscribed on the wall of the cliff was a poem, which began as follows:
Count you the shadows, watch the sun,
The wise know where they stand;
While knowing not the time to shun,
The fools must find themselves undone.
Good fun. We decided that I’d post the entire thing on my private website for them to study later at their leisure, and they headed into the cave. There they discovered the way blocked by three statues, each with hand outstretched. Martin, in a blindingly superior display of intellect (or good guessing), gave the correct statue some treasure, upon which all three moved to let them pass. Quickest 500 XP the group has ever earned!
Emerging from the other side of the rampart, they found themselves in something of a pleasant garden with paths leading north and east; another great cliff rose before them, although they could see rope bridges leading to it from something on this side of the cliff. As they travelled towards the bridges, they came upon an abandoned campsite with a great obelisk overlooking it some forty or fifty feet to the east. The obelisk was topped by a great bronze sphere, reminiscent of a lidded eye. As the group investigated the remnants of the camp, the sphere rotated towards them and cast a spell of sleep upon them; meanwhile, abandoned tools, tents and fire-logs animated and moved in to attack the group!
More proxy fun. One eraser for the obelisk, and a bunch of dice for the minion camp equipment
This was a difficult fight for the characters; for most of the combat, one or two of the characters were sound asleep from the effect of the obelisk! Max cast a spell against the obelisk that critted and almost destroyed it, but it was left to Gillaine to destroy it towards the end of the combat. For an attack mostly by minions, the minions survived a surprisingly long time. A will-o-the-wisp also appeared in the combat, but was much less effective than the minions, who inflicted great damage on the party.
With the campsite cleared, it was now quite late in the evening: 11:30 pm, so we ended the session there. In a fortnight, I hope to continue their investigation of the Garden of Graves, and we'll see what traps and tricks are in store for them.
Apart from being the first session of Tomb of Horrors, this was also the first session that we used the new D&D Fortune cards, of which I'd bought six boosters and we employed as a group deck. They were mostly insignificant, with Martin and Rich only getting to use a card once each in their encounters. Adam and Nathaniel got the lion's share of useful cards, though, with the one significant event being when Adam's character Max attacked the obelisk: a +2 damage for every enemy within 2 of him; this equated to +8 damage, which was very useful. (Of course, he suffered a couple of Opportunity Attacks casting his spell, as he didn't want to waste the extra damage on minions!)
I'm quite favourable towards the cards: in retrospect they gave occasional moments of good fortune, but generally didn't unbalance the game. Some of my players will likely end up with customised decks; we'll see how that goes when it occurs.
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Ramping up my reviewing.
