At the end of our last session, the party found itself one member short after Strik fell in combat against some “ghoul” things and to add insult to injury, had had his body unceremoniously dropped into a chasm (apparently hiding the fact that you are a priest of an evil deity, Shar, didn’t sit too well with some of the party). To make matters worse, a carrion crawler burst out of a tunnel in the chasm wall to chase after the body and was followed by a second one. That’s pretty much where we picked up with this session.
There was a full table this session with all six players in attendance. Thomas is playing a new charcter, Verrak, a dwarven fighter (eldritch knight) who makes his first appearance shortly after we started playing.
This recap is from Todd. My GM comments are in [brackets and italics]. 😉
With grimlocks behind [it wasn’t until later when the dworcs (or was it Verrak) named the creatures as such] and carrion crawlers below, it was deemed an excellent time to go back to the keep. Dench cast a jump spell on Skarr. With the rope tied to the column, Skarr took the other end and easily leapt across the chasm. Skarr braced himself as best he could, and pulled the rope tight. Dru was the first to shimmy across. She took up a spot next to Skarr and with her bow drawn, kept watch as Adran took his turn to cross the chasm.
Adran was just about across when a tentacle struck him. The hit did more than just hurt him, it paralyzed him. Adran wasn’t able to move. As the creature came up to retrieve its food, Dru shot it with an arrow. The carrion crawler pulled Adran from the rope and took him to the bottom of the chasm.
[Adran opted to go across the rope as quickly as possible with little regard for being unnoticed by the crawlers below. 😉 ]
A second carrion crawler came up over the top of the ledge and attacked Skarr with a tentacle. Skarr, being much more resilient than Adran, was not paralyzed. Dench attacked the second creature with his thorn whip spell and pulled the carrion crawler off the chasm edge. It fell to the bottom of the chasm [with a satisfying thwack but it then got back up again.]
Skarr, with the rope in one hand and a sword in the other, swings down to the bottom of the chasm to rescue Adran. Dench shape-changed into a giant spider, crawled over the edge, blocked the tunnel hole, and shot webs at the carrion crawler that had Adran. He missed. Dru and Rory shot arrows at the creatures.
[It was pretty clear that the carrion crawler with Adran was looking to retreat down the tunnel and so Dench may very well have saved Adran from becoming worm food…for now.]
The carrion crawler with Adran made a dash to the end of the chasm. There was another tunnel there. As it started to back in the tunnel, Skarr killed it. The second carrion crawler fled to the other end of the chasm and escaped through a hole.
The party regrouped and continued up to the keep.
Once in Adran’s room, an argument could be heard from out in the courtyard. Lokka was unhappy about something. Adran, being the lord and all, hurried outside to see what was going on.
In the courtyard, Lokka was in a heated argument with Onog and a dwarf. Lokka’s men were on guard, with their weapons drawn. A contingent of about three dozen dworcs were behind Onog and the dwarf.
In a less than lord like manner, Adran made his presence known. He and Lokka exchanged some words and then Lokka strode off [a bit of a disagreement about the dworcs and allowing them into the keep as opposed to camping outside if I recall correctly]. The dwarf introduced himself as Verrak, a scholar of all things dworc. Verrak, in the company of Dru and Rory, went to take a look around the keep. Dworcs approached Adran, asking what they should do. Adran put a dworc in charge, but was reminded from Rory, that Onog was in charge. This caused an issue with the dworc that had just been in charge. He accused Adran of flipping on his word. The dworc left mumbling about union strikes. A dworc named Bartholomew attached himself to Adran, as his valet. At some point, Lokka assigned an orc to keep an eye on Verrak.
Soon the discussion turned to where the dworcs would stay. While this was happening, they heard and saw Onog gather the dworcs into formation and start to march to the keep. Adran inquired about where they were going. Onog just replied, “below”. Again, more talking. {Gasp! Really? In a tabletop rpg?!? Perish the thought!] Onog took the dworcs to the rooms below the keep [the small cells in which the undead dwarves had been previously]. Skarr asked Verrak about the runes on the doors. Verrak explained that the inscriptions were wards. Skarr showed Verrak a book from the underground study [presumed to have been Caill Dafad’s study]. Verrak seemed to have had his interest piqued. Adran gave the ok to let Verrak see the book. Verrak said that the book seemed to be a spell book. Adran agreed to let Verrak see the other books but only one at a time.
Skarr suggested that Adran should get some rest, thereby allowing Skarr to get some rest. Once back in the keep, while waiting for Adran’s bath to be drawn, Ugak came to Skarr talking of having babies and that Skarr was the father. Skarr shrugged it off as nonsense. Verrak explained that it was very probable, since a dworc’s gestation period was about 10 days. Skarr was still unconcerned. Everyone ate dinner. As Adran was getting ready to rest, Dru and Rory came to talk to Adran about a nursery and colors. It was all fun and games until someone got hurt. That someone was Bartholomew. He made a comment, and got punched in the nose by Skarr for his trouble. Skarr told Bartholomew that he wanted the nursery to be the color of his blood. [Bartholomew demanded that his Lord, Adran, do something about the attack. Adran assured the dworc that he would but the “punishment” was pretty much nothing…probably not the justice that Bartholomew was expecting.
Also, Ugak indicated that she was eating for three so it sounds like she might be having twins.]
In the morning, breakfast was disturbed by Lokka bursting into the room, cursing Skarr for fornicating with an abomination. [Lokka has previously expressed just a “tiny” bit of distaste for the dworcs.] Skarr tried to shrug it off, but it was clear he was disturbed after the mention of what his father’s reaction would be. Breakfast concluded and the group prepared to continue the exploration of the tunnels below the keep. The dworcs had made much progress but most ceased working when Adran entered the room [union proud, union strong]. They [the party not the unionized dworcs] went down the shaft. They crossed over the chasm, and noticed that bottom of the chasm was clear of any and all trace of what had happened the previous day [meaning no carrion crawler carcass or the remaining “bits” of Strik’s body (which had already been torn apart pretty well by the crawlers)]. They cautiously explored the tunnels. They found a room with a large fire pit, from beyond that room they could hear drums. Skarr went first.
[That’s a bit of yada yada yada-ing a good bit of the session. In the prior session, the party had only seen a small part of the caverns on the other side of the chasm. The tunnels and chambers were more extensive than had previously been seen. A couple of chambers had small piles of bones and mounds of sinew (given the crude tools previously seen these might have been supplies). Three or four chambers had crude fire pits with ragged furs and debris piled around them…sleeping chambers maybe. A larger chamber was then found with portions of two walls being of dwarven construction with the rest being natural. A large, raised fire pit was near the corner formed by the worked walls. It was also obviously of dwarven construction and the ashes within were still warm.
The beating of war drums began. It was determined that the sound was coming from down a narrow corridor leading out of this chamber. Skarr took the lead squeezing through this tunnel. It opened up into a small chamber but before the half-orc could get a good look around, when a grimlock dropped off of the ceiling and attacked.
That’s where we ended the session.
Beer Log: Using our hit, miss, crit, and fumble rating scale, below is what we sampled this session.
- Proof Brewing’s Orange Crush Blind Fate: A treatment of our local brewery’s gose. A hit but I think I prefer the untreated version better.
- Prairie’s Flare: This was the session of Goses! This one had a nice spiciness to it that set it apart from a lot of goses. Solid hit…I really liked this one.
- Anderson Valley’s Briney Melon: Melon…salt…kind of go together, don’t they? Another hit but I like their Blood Orange Gose better.
- Grimm’s Super Symmetry: I think this might be my first beer from Grimm and it was a promising hit. A good, solid gose with a nice hint of fruit.
- Almanac’s Pumpkin Sour: Love, love, love Almanac’s sours! This one is a bit more of a dark fruit flavor with that tart and tang. Not my favorite Almanac sour but still a solid hit.
- New Glarus’ Wisconsin Belgian Red: Courtesy of RJ…actually his mom but he still gets credit. 😉 New Glarus? Fruit? What more needs to be said? A near crit!
Man…that was a good beer session…assuming you like goses and sours which, of course, I do very, very much. 😉
