If a D&D Party Worked Like Real Life...

No posts for a while, but rest assured exciting things are happening. But enjoy this instead:

Rogue: Ok. Total treasure from that wyrmling red dragon was 100 gold. Not much, but we're a low level party and it gave us all a run for our money. So congratulations, all!

Everyone: Huzzah!

Rogue: Now to divide it up. First, the bard. You get nothing.

Bard: What? Why?

Rogue: That song wasn't very inspiring. And it was totally derivative. It's like, the same song everyone is singing on the corner these days.

Paladin: I always put a little in their begging cups. I like their songs.

Wizard: Yeah, but then some start talking about how awesome their patrons are, and how to get the best deals at this or that merchant stall. So annoying.

Sorcerer: Just stick your hands over your ears during those parts. Or only go to the ones with the begging cups. You don't even have to put money in!

Bard: But what about that one bard who's song got adapted into the play everyone went to see, with the art and tapestries based on it that everyone likes. That bard bought a castle!

Rogue: OBVIOUSLY they're a better bard than you! Jeez, don't be so winey.

Everyone else: Yeah!

Fighter: I bet a hundred monkeys at a hundred sheets of vellum could write a better song, anyway.

Rogue: Right. On to barbarian and fighter. You guys get a copper piece each.

Fighter: What? Why?

Barbarian: Yeah. We literally took the most damage in that fight.

Rogue: Uh, we all have hit points and weapons proficiencies, duh.

Ranger: Yeah, you're not doing anything special.

Druid: Besides, there's like 50 other fighters and 25 other barbarians in the tavern waiting to party. We could replace you guys.

Fighter: But I'm trying to save up to go to Eldritch Knight school so I take less damage.

Wizard: Just get a loan.

Fighter: But I have no credit, and it would be expensive.

Rogue: Never mind. Here's you share. Now, paladin, ranger, warlock, and druid each get a silver each.

Paladin: Glorious!

Ranger: Cool!

Druid: Excellent.

Warlock: Cthulhu is pleased.

Fighter: Wait a minute, the paladin was doing pretty much the same thing I was doing. Why does he get more?

Paladin: Because I had to go to paladin school to learn how to paladin, duh.

Barbarian: And the ranger's animal companion did all the work.

Ranger: Have you tried training an animal companion? It's hard work.

Rogue: And besides, didn't the druid heal you guys that one time?

Druid: I totally did!

Warlock: Cthulhu says this all seems fair.

Rogue: Right, here you go. Ok. Cleric, wizard and sorcerer, you each get a gold piece.

Druid and Paladin: What?

Paladin: Yeah, we took more damage.

Cleric: But I had to go to cleric school, which is way harder than paladin school. And because of that, I'm a better healer.

Fighter: Yeah. You saw that one time he restored both of my kidneys after the dragon ripped them out.

Paladin: But I kept you alive until the cleric could get to you.

Wizard: Ok, both of you shut up. Why does the sorcerer get as much as me? I had to go to wizard school for like eight years. He was just born able to shoot fireballs.

Sorcerer: It's because my ancestors were special. You know when you're ancestors are special you just deserve more. It's common knowledge.

Rogue: That's right, wizard. His ancestors were special.

Everyone grumbles and begins to examine their payment.

The ranger, who is an elf, and the warlock, who is a tiefling, have finished examining their treasure.

Ranger: Hey, wait a minute. This silver was minted in the next kingdom over.

Warlock: According to Cthulhu, that kingdom is experiencing much turmoil.

Ranger: Right, it's been overrun by an orcish horde. So their currency has an unfavorable exchange rate in this kingdom.

Warlock: According to Cthulhu, their currency is worth only 70% of local currency.

Wizard. who is a woman, looks up.

Wizard: Right! You gave me a gold piece from that same kingdom! What gives!

Fighter, a dwarf AND a woman also looks up.

Fighter: I got it even worse. This was minted by the orcish horde's provisional government. It's barely worth half a copper piece at the current exchange rates.

Sorcerer: Come on, it's based on the weight of the metal in the coin, not the currency's value.

Bard: No it isn't. The tri-kingdom area adopted a treaty to move away from out-dated metal-value standards to reduce volatility in the markets.

Wizard: Impressive, bard.

Bard: I took proficiency in history!

Barbarian: Yeah, we all take an elective. I was just double-checking some math with the druid here.

Rogue: Really?

Druid: You never mentioned how much you're getting.

Wizard: Yeah. That's 96 gold, 5 silver, and 8 copper unaccounted for.

Rogue: That's my share, duh.

Sorcerer: But you're ancestors are not special.

Paladin: Yeah, and I took a rogue elective in paladin school so I could get the intimidation skill. Roguing is not hard to do.

Rogue: Hello! I did the most damage.

Fighter: Only because I set you up for that sneak attack.

Rogue: I also took the least damage.

Ranger: Only because you kept trying to hide to set up a sneak attack.

Bard: Yeah. And remember how the dragon had you pinned, but I debuffed its attack with my insult so you could get away.

Rogue: You totally plagiarized that insult, anyway.

Wizard: Yeah, the Monty Python references are getting old.

Warlock: Cthulhu demands we get back to the point at hand. Why does the rogue get to keep all the money?

Everyone else: Yeah!

Rogue: Well, aside from my awesomeness, when I volunteered to keep the party ledger, none of you objected. It only stands to reason the one handling the money should get the most of it. And besides, I already spent it.

Everyone else: What!?

The town watch surrounds the party.

Rogue: I paid up my taxes. Officers, these people are threatening me, could you please take them into custody?

Officers: Yes, sir!

Fighter: But all our weapons are peace knotted!

Wizard: And we're all out of spell slots!

Officer: Stop resisting arrest! Shall I beat them up?

Rogue: Go ahead.

Warlock: Cthulhu shall not forget this!

Rogue: I thought of that, too.

A young red dragon flies down and lands next to the rogue.

Rogue: This is Terminanthraxus. He's agreed to body guard me for a share of my treasure for the next 10 years.

The officers of the watch take away the rest of the party. The guard captain approaches the rogue.

Captain: Ok, you have the donation money for my re-election campaign, right.

Rogue: Duh!

The rogue hands the captain a bag of gold. The captain pockets it and runs off.

Rogue: Don't worry Teminanthraxus, it's just a fraction of what you got. Let's get out of here.

The monk finally arrives.

Monk: Okay guys, do NOT use that outhouse for a couple of hours. Whew!

Monk looks around.

Monk: Guys. Guys? Where'd everybody go?

A New Friend

Another entry from Kyla Cox.

The group, still recovering from their encounter with the raptors, is awoken during the night by the sound of someone running through the jungle towards them. It doesn't take long for the source of the sound to reveal itself: a tiefling Druid, named Chance, being chased through the wildnerness by a pack of angry goblins. A pack of angry goblins from the village the group was searching for, no less!

The would-be killers were quickly routed save for two prisoners. They didn't have much to offer in the way of information. They ranted something about "undead will eat humans, and then Bhatiri will rule" (much to the conternation of the party's human members). They revealed the location of their village and that their queen, Queen Grabstab, carried the amulet to make the construct work. They also mentioned something about ants.

That would prove to be important later.

New found friend Chance in tow, the group soon came upon the village. It wasn't much to look at: a few ramshackle huts, an empty cage of to one side, and ant hills along the other edges. There was also a tree bent low so its top almost touching the ground for some reason. It was quiet at first as the group approached.

At least until Jane attempted to plug the anthill s with honey from the Jug of Alchemy. Then things got very loud. And very violent. Remy and Jane soon had their second brush with death in one day. Jane would have died if not for a quick intervention.

Goblins emerged from the huts, carrying their possessions as if about to flee for their lives. It was only then that the team noticed the rope tied to the tree. The rope that was also looped around the village like a giant slingshot. Some quick thinking (and even quicker talking) defused the trouble. The team left one way, medallion in hand. The goblins?

The goblins left the other way, at high speed, when Jane triggered their slingshot trap.

A few days' trip downstream back to Port Nyanzaru, and the group spent some time gearing up for their return to the wilderness. For their trouble, the casters in the group were gifted a wizard's spellbook chock-full of useful spells for them.

...And Games!

Once more, curtosy of Kyla Cox!

The temple itself proved a problem for the group at the start. Between spike traps spearing anyone trying to make their way down the main hallway, and a pit trap right smack dab in the middle of the ground, our heroes took a few bumps and bruises along the way. The key to avoiding the danger came from their gladiator friend, Taban. He regaled them with a folk story of a man who caried a crocodile on his back after a deal to cross a river.

Being short of crocodiles, the group improvised the next best thing: Remi standing on Brynne's shoulders. Despite their bickering, the duo managed to solve every puzzle and trap left between them and whatever treasure lurked at the heart of the temple. The first impression wasn't much to look at: a sealed jug of some kind. But it wasn't just a jug. It could create any sort of liquid its owners requested, as Remy found out when she asked for some beer.

Returning outside, the group rummaged through the ruins of Camp Righteous for any more clues on Artus and where he may have gone. The road led only to Camp Vengeance and the military outpost there. They rowed upriver for a few days to the gates of Camp Vengeance in search of answers. All they found was a garrison under siege by the undead and an exhausted group of soldiers.

The commander, a pompous windbag if ever there was one, quicky press-ganged our heroes into serving as a scouting party in the woods. Artus was gone, last seen heading west of the camp and seemingly veryconfident about his ability to survive the jungle alone. The group, in a show of cunning, quickly used their "scouting" mission to also check on the construct they were hunting for Wakanga back at Port Nyanzaru.

After a few mishaps involing giant spiders (and a stegosaurus nearly trampling Brynne during an attempt at befriending it), the group then ran across a Cyclops making his way through the woods. Despite no one speaking Giant (and the cyclops not speaking Common), they did manage to get quite a bit of information from him before he set out to find his family. Namely, a reference to a medusa with a connection to the lost capital city of Omu. The same city Artus had been searching for...

Trouble, however, reared its head when the group managed to locate the construct. It came in the form of a pack of velociraptors. A pack of velociraptors with Pack Tactics. They quickly tore through both Brynne and Jane, and only luck (and the raptors' cowardice at being stabbed) kept them from killing Remy as well.

The group, exhausted from their close brush with death, chose to rest for the night at the construct. They'd found half their prize. Now for the other half...

We've got fun...

Once again, thanks to Kyla Cox for keeping the notes and doing the write up!

Things pick up right where they left off: with the party slowly making their way through the dense jungles of Chult. Their progress forward was halted by the smell of death in the air. The smell was soon joined by the sound of heavy footsteps slowly dragging their way through the brush. And then came zombies.

Quite a few zombies, in fact. All of them had a blue triangle painted on their foreheads. A warning? The party didn't know. Between their efforts (and the timely use of Spirit Guardians by their cleric follower), the party made quick work of the pack of undead. Taban, the fighter, made mention of blue triangle-marked zombies typically being found deep in the jungle.

The threat concluded, the group continued their slow progress. But it wasn't long before trouble found them again, this time in the form of a albino dwarves laying in wait with an ambush. Only some quick talking (and some just as quick bargaining for food and water) kept the encounter from getting violent.

The dwarf and his fellows proved surprisingly useful as a source of information. The triangle-marked zombies the party met earlier, he said, were marked as part of an undead army from the time of the Spellplague. He also warned them about a red dragon that had driven the dwarves from their home.

Curiously, he also mentioned that a man named Artis Cimber was seeking the Soul Monger just like the party was. The man had been last seen at Camp Righteous, before it was destroyed by zombies...

After nearly having their supplies stolen in the middle of the night by a pack of goblins, the party ran into another group of people wearing the blue tirangle. Only THESE ones were still very much alive. The sole survivor they took as prisoner spent his time rambling about a "Night Serpent" and the lost capital city of Chult known as Omu.

A few more days of journeying deposited the group at the ruins of Camp Righteous. The place was a wreck, with no sign of anyone living in the vicinity. (The canoes moored at the river bank, however, were a welcome sight after so long spent hacking through the underbrush.) The camp was constructed outside of what looked like a temple. A statue of a man with a crocodile on his back stood just outside the entrance.

Confronted with the lure of gold, our adventurers did what they do best: crept their way inside to see what riches lay ahead. But that is a tale for next time...

Welcome to the Jungle!

This blog post come courtesy of my best friend and partner in crime, Kyla Cox. Read on, adventurers!

Our adventure begins with a motley crew of adventurers entering Baldur's Gate one by one. Some of them have come to strike it rich, and some have come as punishment for breaking the law. Here's the line-up:

Alec, playing Jane Cena, a half-orc bard

Shannon, playing Remy Wiseflaw, a halfling monk (an old friend from Tomb of Horrors)

Laz, playing Orly Owlface, a gnome wizard

Jeff, playing Khungror Earthhide, a dwarf druid

Will, playing R. Frick (yes, his first name is literally R), a goliath cleric

Joseph, playing Grim Buckman, a human rogue (from Storm King's Thunder)

Kyla, playing Brynn Rennock, a human ranger

The party has been hired by Syndra Sylvane, a wealthy noble living in Baldur's Gate, to mount an expedition to the Chultan Peninsula in order to uncover the cause of a mysterious illness racing through the world: the Death Curse. It afflicts those previously restored to life by magic, and those afflicted by the curse waste away bit by bit every day until they die. And once dead in any way, no one can be revived. Not even by clerics or paladins of holy faith.

Syndra herself is suffering from the curse. She greets the party while wrapped up under a blanket, sounding raspy and sick. She offers them wine (Jane chugs an entire bottle and bounces the cork off of Brynn's head with one good spit). Syndra herself doesn't know much about Chult; much of the area is unmapped and is no doubt full of dangers. The curse is believed to originate with a relic of necromantic power knows as the "Soulmonger".

After a bit of haggling, the group convinces her to pay them 50 GP each as spending money for supplies. She also offers them 1 magical item each upon completion of the hunt for the cause. They have approximately 79 days before the curse kills Syndra.

After teleporting to Port Nyanzaru, the main settlement on Chult, the group joined Syndra in visiting the villa of merchant prince Wakanga O'Tamu. He give the party the lay of the land in Port Nyanzaru: explaining the merchant princes and the Flaming Fist patrols out of Fort Belaurian. He also offers a quest to give the group the lay of the land: locate the control amulet for a shield guardian called Vorn and return it to him.

Most of the party spent the first day in preparation for the trip. Mostly. R Frick negotiates the purchase of a hadrosaur for half of the offered price. A sizeable chunk of the party bets on the local dinosaur race (and promptly loses because the odds are decidedly not in their favor). Brynn takes on an odd job as a bookie's hired muscle, promptly loses when the target of the debt, a gladiator named Taban picks a fight, and walks out with a new friend and a splitting headache. In Brynne's defense, gladiators are challenge 5 NPCs with buckets of hit points and high damage potential.

Jane and Frick, showing what real friendship looks like, bet against her success.

Remi, however, has a moment of pure heriocs in rescuing a Chultan man's husband from being mauled to death by raptors in a fighting pit. Jane helps by casing Sleep on the dinos (and providing a distraction while the others slip away unnoticed).

Orly remained in Wakanga's villa, studying in the library, and eventually learns of a ruined city upriver, said to be guarded by a wise and generous naga...

The group meets a representative of the Order of the Gauntlet who requires an escort to Camp Vengeance, further inland. So, with a priest, a gladiator, and a dinosaur in tow, they set out.

Not long after leaving, however, they meet a Flaming Fist Patrol requesting their exploration permit. After some quick negotiations with the Flaming Fist mercenaries, they are allowed to pass unhindered. The next time, however, may not end as easily as the first.

This is where we leave our party: cutting a path through the jungle towards Camp Vengance, meeting the local homicidal fauna (a constrictor snake) and flora (a mobile, poisonous flower called a tri-flower frond) and all-too-aware of the time that's slipping away from them with every day...

Undead suck, demons suck, dragons suck

So shit continues to happen. But on a more personal front, this company wants to publish my novels. I've been focusing on writing those, and I'll be focusing on them for a while. But this blog will continue. I already have some help.

So, we started exploring the undead infested portion of the forge. We managed to find a dwarven shrine containing Durgeddin's body, as well as a wight and some skeletons. Life drain sucks. Usually the life out of you. Ask Phox. Kyla seems to have the worst luck with these: first Tathora now Phox.

Then we found a ghostly dwarf when Hoggle peaked into a room. It used a feature called horrifying visage to age Hoggle and Phox 40 years. Hoggle, being a gnome, didn't care so much, but Phox is now 60. Then the ghost possessed Hoggle. And started attacked Hiro. We used some percussive exorcism to knock the ghost out of him. After we banished it, we took a short rest.

Most of the rest of this area contained smashed furniture and and dwarf skeletons. Rooms full of nightmares are best not gone into, so we left them alone. We came upon a nice, fancy bedroom with a suspiciously well described rug. Lydia nudged it with mage hand and of course it sprang to life. Hiro watched Aladdin too many times as a child (How is that possible? Reasons!) and tried to ride him. So it did what rugs of smothering do: wrapped him up and tried to smother him. We beat the rug and moved on.

The next interesting thing we came across was a library where a suspiciously beautiful woman was reading at a table. Phox talked to her, and learned her name was Idalla and that she was trapped in that room by a wizard living somewhere below us. She wanted us to go and kill the wizard and free her. In the meantime, Phox and Squiz examined a few books. Lydia, feeling a little deceptive, told Idalla we already had killed the wizard. Whether or not Idalla believed the lie, she chose that moment to reveal herself as a succubus and cast charm. Lydia was a little miffed at her friends hurting her new BFF, but she laid a deadly smooch on Lydia, knocking her out. Phox got a little miffed by this, and grappled the demon. The demon just charmed Hiro, instead. Hoggle handed out some bardic inspiration, then dropped silence to prevent Hiro from casting spells. But Phox finally dropped the demon.

After we recovered, we found a series of secret doors that ended at a natural cavern at the lip of chasm with a rope ladder leading down into it. We climbed down to a muddy waterfall pool. Lydia identified the tracks in the mud as belonging to a dragon.

We probably should have taken a long rest before continuing. But screw that, we're adventurers! Also, Alec let us level to 5 and granted us the benefit of a long rest for leveling. A narrow beach around an underground lake with an island heaped with treasure. Seems totally safe. We crossed a crumbly bridge, separating the party when it collapsed after Squiz crossed. Then the dragon, a black dragon, struck by sticking it's head out of the water and breathing it's line of acid. It dropped Vrinn and Hoggle on the first round.

Alec just made an unconsciounable number of recharge rolls on that breath weapon. It was able to use it almost every round.

Lydia used a scroll of spider climb to use the walls and ceiling to get around the bridge. Hiro made everyone invisible again after another wild magic surge. This included the dragon. It didn't last long, the dragon breathed again. The most beneficial effect we got, however, was when Hiro's surge cast fly on Squiz. He flew to the island and found a wand of magic missiles in the dragon's hoard. Then Hiro got breathed on and got dropped. Phox and Tog managed to use a Healer's Kit and potions to revive or stabilize people, getting Hoggle back on his feet, who was able to get Vrinn back on his feet. Then the dragon breathed again and killed Hoggle outright.

Lydia broke out a new spell hunger of Hadar, to create an area of icky, tentacly, whispery blackness that finally smoked the dragon out of the water. Tog finally got the killing blow, and Hiro stabilized on his own.

We hauled Hoggle back to town for resurrection, since we had the money now, thanks to the dragon's hoard.

Next week, Tomb of Annihilation begins. It's gonna be fun!

Dig, dig, dig!

Tragedy seems thick on the ground these days: but you can help here!

Also, we're no longer AL. We moved to la Casa de Yaeger, and it was pretty nice. Quiet dinner table and not having to shout over a crowd of people. Of course, Calvin no longer felt he could make it. So we were down Bruenor.

So, as I predicted: Herman died again as he unlived: being a meat shield. He opened the door and got sprayed with all the alchemist fire. Enough it overwhelmed his Undead Resilience. We didn't have time to pour one for our deader buddy. The room beyond contained nothing of interest, however: just some reservoirs of alchemist fire and the trap mechanism. The door did start to close, presumably resetting the trap, but Phox wedged it open.

We explored the southernmost door in that same room and ran into an orc shaman and some body guards. Once again, Vrinn got to open up, but I scored a critical hit on the follow-up.  Hiro got to use another spell out of Elemental Evil: Snilloc's snowball swarm. It hits an area with snowballs. Phox but the finishing hit on the shaman, Shannon tried a new, and effective tactic, in this battle. Hoggle opened with bane and supplemented it with Cutting Words. The notion being that a bard's de-buffs are more effective than their healing. In this case it did prevent Squiz from having a new axe-hole being torn in him. Once again, Jeff decided to hit the RNG button for a wild surge. Summoning some flumphs, which scared poor Phox.

We did find some alchemists' tools in the shaman's lair. Which would have been nice for harvesting that alchemist fire. If anyone had the proficiency. Instead we climbed down.

The stairs were cut into the stone and lead to some natural and excavated caves. At one point, a stream crossed them: a rill! D&D is good for your vocabulary, kids! Because we all want that 100% Map Completion Trophy, we followed the stream.

It led to a little side cave that served as a lair for more stirges. They had managed to exsanguinate another adventurer, and we looted the corpse. We continued down the stream, and Lydia fell heels over ass down into a larger cavern, where the stairs would have eventually led us. Now, with several passages to traverse, we went for left-hand most one first, coming upon a group of troglodytes, stinky subterranean lizard people in D&D monster terms. The real fun was a locked gate in their lair.

Phox loudly proclaimed, "There's no bears in caves" before we opened it. Of course there was a bear. This, apparently, made out barbarian angry. So she raged and grappled it. In effort to help her pet human, Lydia used hex on the bear's Strength, to give it disadvantage on the checks needed to escape a grapple. This gave Vrinn the opportunity to sneak attack it in the hit points, dropping it.

We continued on, finding ourselves in a forest of fungi. Some of it glowed, of course. We came to a side ledge, an iron gate, and a grand stair case. Since we just had to have that 100% map, and Hoggle volunteered to go first, Phox hoisted him up onto that latch. Only for a couple of gricks to attack. These ugly things are resistant to non-magical attacks. So, pretty tough on their own. But then a giant subterranean lizard attacked us, too. It put the bite on Phox, holding her in it's jaws. Once again, Lydia used hex, not wanting the funny human to die. Jeff mashed the RNG button again with Hiro using a wild surge, turning everything and everyone in the fight invisible. This did allow Vrinn to end the fight with a sneak attack on the last remaining grick after everything else was dropped. Unfortunately, Phox and Hoggle both got dropped. With the healer down, we had to use a potion of healing.

We found some dead adventurers in a back cave past the ledge. We looted the corpses, then barricaded ourselves in for a nice long rest.

Then we climbed up that long flight of stairs, coming to an unlocked iron door. We heard the sound of hammers on anvils beyond. Seems someone or something was still making those weapons! It lead into an octagonal room lined with doors and more statues or armed dwarves. Hiro went up to a door and a statue attacked him. To add insult to injury, the door was false. Hoggle searched around for more traps, but some poor rolling led to the conclusion that nope, there were no more traps! Then Squiz tried to open another door and also got hit by a statue. Again, the door was false and trixie. Why did we send the arcane casters, the squishiest party members, to check for traps? Reasons.

So, Lydia, another arcane caster, but slightly less squishy, looked around and found a secret door with her drow eyes. She, however, exercised a little prudence and opened it with mage hand. It led to a pillared throne room. As we arrived, we heard a voice, possibly an alarm, shout something in dwarvish about intruders. We moved in cautiously and were confronted by duergar. These subterranean dwarves aren't generally regarded as altruistic, but are willing to treat with other races from time to time. So we opened with parley.

The dwarves told us they were reactivating the forge for their own business, which was none of ours, thank you. They told us there were undead roaming some rooms to the north that needed clearing, and also let us know that a dragon lived in the lower levels of the complex on top of a treasure hoard. They offered to take us to the dragon for 200gp. Hoggle tried to barter with a potion, that was in fact poison, but failed. Then Lydia offered to clear the undead for them for half that fee, and they agreed.

Alec really wanted us to just go to the dragon. He wants to take a break from running, even though he's pretty darn good. He wants to go to Chult and fight Acererak.

But, we took the undead option. In return for the promise that we could keep any treasure we found. Looks like he'll have to run another week or two. I'll be good to go.