Newbieville: Delving the Dungeon
Hello again, friends! I'm back again with the latest installment of Welcome to Newbieville, by all-newbie D&D campaign specifically designed for teaching the game to first-time players. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can read about the concept a bit HERE and check out the first session summary HERE. Here's a reminder of the current PC roster:
Belwarum — dragonborn sorcerer, hermit background
Tika — elf rogue, outlander background
Lady Elka — human monk, noble background
Sir Thorin — dwarf paladin, noble background
Last time, Bel and Tika were absent, so Elka and Thorin did some scouting of a recently-discovered dungeon and nearly got themselves killed. This week, we started with a fresh new morning and the party getting up to speed with each other over breakfast. While absent and off-camera, Belwarum had spent the previous session's two days making healing potions out of the remainder of the herbs they'd gathered, and now they were ready to tackle "The Bug" and finish exploring the dungeon.
I also noted to them that — perhaps overlooked by the busy Elka and Thorin who spent most of the past two days in the woods and dungeon — the town had changed lately. The buildings were all finished, so tents were disappearing as carpenters started to pack up and leave. Other contractors had arrived and begun work renovating the wizard tower, and the blacksmith had opened up shop. This prompted the immediate pawning of the ornate breastplate they'd found earlier, and the purchase of slightly better armor for Thorin.
Interestingly, the party then spontaneously decided to head to the municipal building to see if there were any new paid quests available. This gave me an opportunity to mention that the mayor was in a meeting, but none of the players inquired further about that. To make sure they were filled in, I had them see from a distance as they headed for the dungeon that someone in fancy clothes was climbing into a carriage parked near the municipal building, and drove away.
Curious, the team headed into the tavern to ask who the visitor was, and learned that it was a local(ish) minor noble known as Lord Devien. Since two PCs had the noble background, they had at least heard of him, knowing that he was a noble of relatively low rank but relatively high wealth. They also knew that it was common for a town to enter an arrangement with a noble, such that the noble funds and administers a town guard (or, for a larger city, an army or defense force) in exchange for partial ownership stakes (and thus, a financial share) in the town's profitable businesses.
The players correctly guessed that Lord Devien was the one who had been in the meeting with the mayor, but decided to mess with that later and head back to the dungeon. Their first order of business was to take out that bug, which they planned to ambush, but discovered it had moved, and combat broke out normally. It was a much easier fight this time around, with the ankheg only biting once, which was blocked by a shield spell from Belwarum.
Their next goal was to investigate the large, bone-strewn chamber which housed a stone throne. They all crept in from different doors, and immediately a phase spider appeared behind one of them. But then that Alert feat on Lady Elka kicked in, and she rolled really high initiative, so she roughed it up a bit before it could bite anyone. Of course, that meant it decided to bite her, which dealt an obscene amount of damage and dropped her. The rest of the party smoked it, at which I suddenly realized something...
I forgot to have it disappear after its attack! That's the phase spider's whole deal! The thing that makes it a phase spider! And I forgot to do it!
Ugh. Oh well.
Anyway, after that, they found a series of secret doors, which resulted in a few more fights (a ghast, some magma mephits, and a rug of smothering — not all at once) and the discovery of some sweet loot in the form of magic items. Tika, now an Arcane Trickster with the Identify spell, identified one item as being a Gem of Brightness with 33 charges left, and it was trivial to recognize a scroll of invisibility. That just leaves a mysterious cloak and set of bracers to check out, so they've got some homework when they get back to town.
Which will be soon, because by that time they were tapped and ready to retreat. We left off the session as they decided to call it a day, so next time we'll pick up with them coming back to town. And since the dungeon is more or less clear, it'll be time to engage with this whole Lord Devien issue, which will really take things in a different direction than the campaign has gone so far — have you noticed that all they've fought is things that could eat them? New types of challenges await!
Until next time, take care of each other, okay?
Enjoying the Find Familiar blog? Check out my other work!
Belwarum — dragonborn sorcerer, hermit background
Tika — elf rogue, outlander background
Lady Elka — human monk, noble background
Sir Thorin — dwarf paladin, noble background
Last time, Bel and Tika were absent, so Elka and Thorin did some scouting of a recently-discovered dungeon and nearly got themselves killed. This week, we started with a fresh new morning and the party getting up to speed with each other over breakfast. While absent and off-camera, Belwarum had spent the previous session's two days making healing potions out of the remainder of the herbs they'd gathered, and now they were ready to tackle "The Bug" and finish exploring the dungeon.
I also noted to them that — perhaps overlooked by the busy Elka and Thorin who spent most of the past two days in the woods and dungeon — the town had changed lately. The buildings were all finished, so tents were disappearing as carpenters started to pack up and leave. Other contractors had arrived and begun work renovating the wizard tower, and the blacksmith had opened up shop. This prompted the immediate pawning of the ornate breastplate they'd found earlier, and the purchase of slightly better armor for Thorin.
Interestingly, the party then spontaneously decided to head to the municipal building to see if there were any new paid quests available. This gave me an opportunity to mention that the mayor was in a meeting, but none of the players inquired further about that. To make sure they were filled in, I had them see from a distance as they headed for the dungeon that someone in fancy clothes was climbing into a carriage parked near the municipal building, and drove away.
Curious, the team headed into the tavern to ask who the visitor was, and learned that it was a local(ish) minor noble known as Lord Devien. Since two PCs had the noble background, they had at least heard of him, knowing that he was a noble of relatively low rank but relatively high wealth. They also knew that it was common for a town to enter an arrangement with a noble, such that the noble funds and administers a town guard (or, for a larger city, an army or defense force) in exchange for partial ownership stakes (and thus, a financial share) in the town's profitable businesses.
The players correctly guessed that Lord Devien was the one who had been in the meeting with the mayor, but decided to mess with that later and head back to the dungeon. Their first order of business was to take out that bug, which they planned to ambush, but discovered it had moved, and combat broke out normally. It was a much easier fight this time around, with the ankheg only biting once, which was blocked by a shield spell from Belwarum.
Their next goal was to investigate the large, bone-strewn chamber which housed a stone throne. They all crept in from different doors, and immediately a phase spider appeared behind one of them. But then that Alert feat on Lady Elka kicked in, and she rolled really high initiative, so she roughed it up a bit before it could bite anyone. Of course, that meant it decided to bite her, which dealt an obscene amount of damage and dropped her. The rest of the party smoked it, at which I suddenly realized something...
I forgot to have it disappear after its attack! That's the phase spider's whole deal! The thing that makes it a phase spider! And I forgot to do it!
Ugh. Oh well.
Anyway, after that, they found a series of secret doors, which resulted in a few more fights (a ghast, some magma mephits, and a rug of smothering — not all at once) and the discovery of some sweet loot in the form of magic items. Tika, now an Arcane Trickster with the Identify spell, identified one item as being a Gem of Brightness with 33 charges left, and it was trivial to recognize a scroll of invisibility. That just leaves a mysterious cloak and set of bracers to check out, so they've got some homework when they get back to town.
Which will be soon, because by that time they were tapped and ready to retreat. We left off the session as they decided to call it a day, so next time we'll pick up with them coming back to town. And since the dungeon is more or less clear, it'll be time to engage with this whole Lord Devien issue, which will really take things in a different direction than the campaign has gone so far — have you noticed that all they've fought is things that could eat them? New types of challenges await!
Until next time, take care of each other, okay?
______________________________________
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