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Session 3
July 6, 2008
So, we left off with the PCs rescuing the merchants...but discovering that Finnley was not among the freed prisoners, as he had been taken to the "Mines of Pain". The party (who now realizes that they need a name) leads the freed caravan members back to Greenvale. Once there, Ugnar's father cures his son and Gumba of their filth fever and the party spends the day recovering from the battle. Ugar heads over to the Temple and sulks that he was felled by disease and could not aid in the rescue of the prisoners. He meditates after being cured of the Filth Fever so that he may swap out an at will power when he levels,and is given a pep talk by his father. The party is then joined by Ziggy, who apparently came out of nowhere...and it's then that I notice that the two dragonborn have no backstory.... we'll have to fix that. Auronn findsthe caravan master (Finnley's father) and tells him that his son was taken to the Mines of Pain, and his hopes sink. Auronn tries to reassure him by pulling out a map and pointing out that he's probably somewhere in the Valley of Horrors...and if not there, then he is probably somewhere in the Flooded Mountain, and if not there he might be in or near the Pit of Despair or some other place with a scary name. He says to give them a few days and they'll sort it out and rescue him...no worries Why would they take him to the Mines of Pain and kill him? They OBVIOUSLY need slaves to work the mines... at this point Dillingham intervenes in the sorrowful report before it gets worse. Dillingham also relays that a local hunter, Jhym the Shifter, had seen goblins with mining equipment a few months back in an area south of where the PCs rescued the merchants. With this news, the intrepid seven set out before dawn's first light and we are back into the mix.
First they go back to the original goblin cave and the Saurros (a ranger) finds a trail that leads them in the direction they want to go. Upon exiting the forest at a rocky ridge, they find a small goblin outpost/guard tower right beside a trail leading in to the rocky hills. Paydirt! A quick battle ensues and the fearless party makes relatively short work of the goblins and their pet fire beetle. After a quick search (and preventing Ziggy from burning the guard tower down) they head up the trail. Once again Saurros picks up a trail and leads them directly to the mine entrance. Here, in a shallow bowl of a valley, they see several goblin huts and two relatively nicer hide tents. To no one's surprise, there are goblins milling about. Here the players start complaining about only fighting goblins (I knew that was going to happen sooner or later) and as they start to lay in the hapless greenskins, one of them runs away into a cave. In another round the little creature comes back with his big buddy.... an Ogre. The tree trunk wielding brute comes out and the party wisely decides to concentrate firepower on him. Daily powers are used (the warlock's FLAMES OF PHLEGETOS delivering 25+ in the initial attack and racked up another 15 in ongoing damage that the ogre could not shake). The remainin goblins, unfortunately, proved to be worthless during the time the PCs were ignoring them for the ogre, and were quickly dispatched of after that. A little after melee ransacking of the tents shows that the hide tents are obviously not for goblins and also contained an amulet of protection and a potion of healing.
Next, they (naturally) head inside the cave to see what makes these mines so painful. A short walk brings them to a room where several goblins guard a shaft in the floor. Over this hole is a whole platform and winch apperatus for lowering said platform down into the mines. The battle proves to be short and fairly uneventful, except for the fact that this marks a milestone and everyone gains an action point. Up until this point, no one has really even used an action point (maybe once in both the other sessions combined) so everyone just records it and moves on..... down the hole. And this is where things get interesting.
I had an idea the week before and we busted out the old Necromunda set. For those who do not know what Necromunda is, it's an offshoot of Warhammer 40K by Games Workshop. The game came with 3D terrain that you could configure just about anyway you wanted, composed of cardboard platforms and plastic bulkheads. So, using this we moved to the mines where the PCs lowered themselves down a dark shaft that opened up to a large void in the earth. In this space, that plunges to unknown depths, the goblins built a huge scaffold and as the characters lower themselves down the find their guests waiting. The landing area has a low wall around it and only one way off on to the platform so the battle begins with a focus on the fighters in the front. I'll spare the details and just list some highlights here.
Okay, here is one pic, just as a sampler and so I can point out who is who:
Okay: Blue with Bow is Saurros, Next to him in black is Evan, In front of Evan is Ugnar (the Minotaur), Auronn in Green, Marinn in front of Auronn, Ziggy the heavily armored dude is in front of Ugnar, and Gumba is barely visable at the front of the PC cluster. The scaffold is made up of dungeon tiles and necromunda bulkheads (FYI: The tiles are thick and do not fit in the bulkheads all that well).
The battle raged for a while and in the end the PCs were victorious, and while beaten up to some degree, no one went down (though a few well timed second winds on the players' parts is what prevented that).
So, the battle ended and we halted there (yes, I awarded XP to bring some of the guys up to second level and legitimize my recalculating the next few encounters to challenge seven PCs).
Good Things
Meh Things
Players present:*
- Auronn - Half Elf Warlock (played by xmanowarx)
- Ugnar - Minotaur Cleric of Kord/Pelor (also played by xmanowarx)
- Gumba - Dwarf Fighter (played by dumdragon)
- Evan - Human Wizard (also played by dumdragon)
- Saurros - Elven Ranger (played by Draxthis)
- Marinn - Dragonborn Warlord (also played by Draxthis)
- Ziggy - Dragonborn Fighters (played by Draxthis' brother)
*Okay, now we had everyone and well, since some people were playing two characters we kept that up just for continuity's sake. I will say this, running 7 PCs can really mess with a DM's plans...
So, we left off with the PCs rescuing the merchants...but discovering that Finnley was not among the freed prisoners, as he had been taken to the "Mines of Pain". The party (who now realizes that they need a name) leads the freed caravan members back to Greenvale. Once there, Ugnar's father cures his son and Gumba of their filth fever and the party spends the day recovering from the battle. Ugar heads over to the Temple and sulks that he was felled by disease and could not aid in the rescue of the prisoners. He meditates after being cured of the Filth Fever so that he may swap out an at will power when he levels,and is given a pep talk by his father. The party is then joined by Ziggy, who apparently came out of nowhere...and it's then that I notice that the two dragonborn have no backstory.... we'll have to fix that. Auronn findsthe caravan master (Finnley's father) and tells him that his son was taken to the Mines of Pain, and his hopes sink. Auronn tries to reassure him by pulling out a map and pointing out that he's probably somewhere in the Valley of Horrors...and if not there, then he is probably somewhere in the Flooded Mountain, and if not there he might be in or near the Pit of Despair or some other place with a scary name. He says to give them a few days and they'll sort it out and rescue him...no worries Why would they take him to the Mines of Pain and kill him? They OBVIOUSLY need slaves to work the mines... at this point Dillingham intervenes in the sorrowful report before it gets worse. Dillingham also relays that a local hunter, Jhym the Shifter, had seen goblins with mining equipment a few months back in an area south of where the PCs rescued the merchants. With this news, the intrepid seven set out before dawn's first light and we are back into the mix.
First they go back to the original goblin cave and the Saurros (a ranger) finds a trail that leads them in the direction they want to go. Upon exiting the forest at a rocky ridge, they find a small goblin outpost/guard tower right beside a trail leading in to the rocky hills. Paydirt! A quick battle ensues and the fearless party makes relatively short work of the goblins and their pet fire beetle. After a quick search (and preventing Ziggy from burning the guard tower down) they head up the trail. Once again Saurros picks up a trail and leads them directly to the mine entrance. Here, in a shallow bowl of a valley, they see several goblin huts and two relatively nicer hide tents. To no one's surprise, there are goblins milling about. Here the players start complaining about only fighting goblins (I knew that was going to happen sooner or later) and as they start to lay in the hapless greenskins, one of them runs away into a cave. In another round the little creature comes back with his big buddy.... an Ogre. The tree trunk wielding brute comes out and the party wisely decides to concentrate firepower on him. Daily powers are used (the warlock's FLAMES OF PHLEGETOS delivering 25+ in the initial attack and racked up another 15 in ongoing damage that the ogre could not shake). The remainin goblins, unfortunately, proved to be worthless during the time the PCs were ignoring them for the ogre, and were quickly dispatched of after that. A little after melee ransacking of the tents shows that the hide tents are obviously not for goblins and also contained an amulet of protection and a potion of healing.
Next, they (naturally) head inside the cave to see what makes these mines so painful. A short walk brings them to a room where several goblins guard a shaft in the floor. Over this hole is a whole platform and winch apperatus for lowering said platform down into the mines. The battle proves to be short and fairly uneventful, except for the fact that this marks a milestone and everyone gains an action point. Up until this point, no one has really even used an action point (maybe once in both the other sessions combined) so everyone just records it and moves on..... down the hole. And this is where things get interesting.
I had an idea the week before and we busted out the old Necromunda set. For those who do not know what Necromunda is, it's an offshoot of Warhammer 40K by Games Workshop. The game came with 3D terrain that you could configure just about anyway you wanted, composed of cardboard platforms and plastic bulkheads. So, using this we moved to the mines where the PCs lowered themselves down a dark shaft that opened up to a large void in the earth. In this space, that plunges to unknown depths, the goblins built a huge scaffold and as the characters lower themselves down the find their guests waiting. The landing area has a low wall around it and only one way off on to the platform so the battle begins with a focus on the fighters in the front. I'll spare the details and just list some highlights here.
- As the battle progresses, a goblin hexer and a sharpshooter arrive out of one of the side caves on to the scaffold. This is much to the party's dismay as they found the hexers to be a pain.
- Sure enough, ANOTHER hexer arrives with two sharpshooters out of the other side cave.... the battle picks up speed.
- Ugnar pushes a goblin warrior off the edge of the landing platform. It manages to catch the edge and hang on, but Ugnar spends an action point to punish the critter with his morning star and sends the poor creature to its death on a lower level.
- Action point expenditures abounded! I think just about everyone spent one if not both of their action points. The poor goblins didn't stand a chance.
- Evan holds a defensive position on the landing platform behind the low wall and directs his flaming sphere all over the place, thus perfectly fullfilling his role as a controller from his personal little booth on the landing platform.
- A couple of PCs were blinded by the hexers, but that just seemed to spark better rolls... Saurros gets blinded and retorts with a twin strike arrow attack, composed of a critical hit and kills the very hexer for blinding him. Poetically, I ruled that the arrows bury themselves in the hexer's eye sockets and the critter drops to the depths below.
- We took pictures (like the true geeks we are) and I uploaded them to the photogallery...(gallery link at top of page)
Okay, here is one pic, just as a sampler and so I can point out who is who:
Okay: Blue with Bow is Saurros, Next to him in black is Evan, In front of Evan is Ugnar (the Minotaur), Auronn in Green, Marinn in front of Auronn, Ziggy the heavily armored dude is in front of Ugnar, and Gumba is barely visable at the front of the PC cluster. The scaffold is made up of dungeon tiles and necromunda bulkheads (FYI: The tiles are thick and do not fit in the bulkheads all that well).
The battle raged for a while and in the end the PCs were victorious, and while beaten up to some degree, no one went down (though a few well timed second winds on the players' parts is what prevented that).
So, the battle ended and we halted there (yes, I awarded XP to bring some of the guys up to second level and legitimize my recalculating the next few encounters to challenge seven PCs).
Good Things
- 3D Terrain. Not to toot my own horn, but I am liking the multi-level thing and the players did too.
- 7 PCs has a good advantage in that all the roles are covered (sometimes in duplicate), however... see below
- Dungeon Tiles have really paid off. They are turning out to be a good investment.
Meh Things
- 7 PCs really screws with the encounters (especially when they are set up for 5 PCs). I think I got it worked out for next session though
- The dungeon tiles are too thick for the Necromunda bulkheads... gotta figure something out there before I break them. That would suck.
4e Crunch
Goblin Outpost/Guard Tower1 Goblin Sharpshooter (MM 137 - lvl 2 Artil), 3 Goblin Cutters (MM 136 - lvl 1 minions), 3 Goblin Warriors (MM 137 - lvl 1 skirms), and 1 Fire Beetle (MM 30 - lvl 1 Brute) XP = 600 (85 each PC)Mining Camp6 Goblin Cutters, 2 Goblin Warriors, and 1 Ogre Savage (MM 198 - lvl 8 Brute!) XP = 700 (100 each PC)Mine Shaft Room2 Goblin Skullcleavers (MM 137 - lvl 3 Brutes), 4 Goblin Cutters, 2 Goblin Warriors XP = 600 (85 each PC)Mines of Pain - the platform2 Goblin Hexers (MM 137 - lvl 3 Control), 5 Goblin Sharpshooters, 4 Goblin Cutters, 3 Goblin Warriors, 1 Goblin Skullcleaver XP = 1475 (211 each PC)
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, Jul 9 2008, 9:47 AM EDT
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