LFG: The Great Mudpit Caper

Game Date: 11/9/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 17
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Baer a.k.a. "Halfbeard" (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius (James) - Human Cleric
Jared (Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus (Thomas) - Human Monk
Vikao (Daniel) - Human Ranger

The Session:
I missed the 10/26 session.  Apparently they reached a village inside a volcano.  The villagers asked our party to battle some cannibals that had been attacking the village.  They spent a good deal of last session fighting these cannibals.  They ended the session thwarted by a blocked tunnel.

Today we broke down a wall and started exploring some of the enemy tunnels.  After a few turns, the floor fell out from under us, dropping Halfbeard and Barad into a water-filled dungeon.  We went ahead and started investigating that level, slogging through chest-deep water past some old prison cells and torture devices.  Jared discovered a secret door which led to a room full of statues.

Statues... of Doom!

Of course the statues came to life and attacked us; what other reason would there be to have a room full of statues in D&D?  If I were the king of a fantasy realm, my first act would be have all sculptors put to death.  Anyway, these statues hit hard, and they were all around us.  At first we were getting creamed, until we fled the room and fought them in the doorway instead.  After that the fight was much easier, but we still used up a lot of healing resources.

Two of the statues fled through a trapdoor in the roof, but we caught up with them afterwards and destroyed them as well.  Back in the hallway and through another door, we found an enormous room filled with deep water.  The water was too murky to see anything.  It looks like the perfect place for an eventual boss fight.  We didn't want to mess with it just yet, so we picked a different hallway.

Ghouls... of Doom!

At the end of another long passage, we fought eight ghouls.  The hallway was only ten feet wide, so it was a rather structured fight.  Front fighters take out an enemy, move into the square, wash rinse repeat.  At the end of that hall we found a room with an altar, and looted a bone-handled mace.  We wanted to take a closer look at it, but we were pressured for time - our pushy Cleric was hoping to trigger another encounter before his Bless wore off.

No such luck.  We spent a good while exploring more halls, opening doors and getting very wet from the ensuing floods.  One particular blast of water swept us down some stairs, landing us in a cavern full of sand and mud pits.  The sand was very warm, and the mud pits were boiling.  We were afraid to explore too far into this cave just yet, so we headed back up the stairs.

Giant pool... of Doom!

In the next room we triggered a powerful flame trap.  Most of us were burned, some quite badly, and the damage continued due to burning oil and smoke inhalation.  Once the last of the water, smoke, and fire cleared out of the room, we sat down for an extended rest.  We ended the session there.  We believe the adjoining hallway leads back toward the giant pool room, so we'll probably head there next.

Update: I missed the 11/23 game due to it being an international geek holiday (The Day of the Doctor).  I don't know what happened, but here's where things left off, courtesy of Rusty:  "...the game ended with a mind-controlled Barad, Jaraed, and Golog fighting Damethius, Vikao, Steif, etc.  Steif briefly switched sides, but as things ended, Jaraed and the pirate wench were outright killed."  It looks like we'll be doing some Pathfinder playtesting for the next few weeks, so it might be a while before we see how things turn out.

LFG: Roc Falls, Wizard Gnome Dies

Game Date: 10/12/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 15
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Baer a.k.a. "Halfbeard" (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (James, subbing for Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius (James) - Human Cleric
Doran of Clan Hawk (Eddie) - Human Barbarian
Jared (Cliff, subbing for Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus (Daniel, subbing for Thomas) - Human Monk
Vikao (Daniel) - Human Ranger
Woil Xurcaine (Daniel) - Gnome Wizard
Zuul the Sleep Deprived (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:

Braaaains... nope, none here.

When we left off last session, we had befriended some exiles from Doran's tribe, who allowed us to make camp with them.  While Zuul and Demethius were on the first watch of the night, the encampment was attacked by a group of ghoulish undead.  Since most of us had been sound asleep, it took us a round or two for us to join in the fun.  Unfortunately we didn't yet have the benefit of an extended rest, so we had to face this battle with limited resources.  Jared used Entangle for a little crowd control, and Zuul's Turn Undead caused half of the enemies to flee the area.  The rest of the deadites didn't take too long to finish off.  We watched out for an hour or so to see if any more appeared, and then went back to bed.  Good thing that won't happen again, right?

Gamer Food

A few hours later our sleep was interrupted again, this time by the sound of birds screeching.  I'm starting to call this "The Island That Never Sleeps" because we so rarely make it through an entire rest.  This time the encampment under siege from a pair of Rocs, who kept swooping down and carrying off villagers.  One went straight for Woil, the party Wizard.  At first he managed to push it away with Thunderwave, but on the next round it ate him.  As one of the lower-level party members, he had a max HP of 12.  The Roc hit him for 32 damage, swallowing the little Gnome in one gulp. (Not the healthiest diet, but at least it wasn't beef snacks in spray cheese.)  We never even had the chance to heal him.

Steif was the next to get carried off.  While flying through the air in a Roc's beak, Steif attacked the monstrous bird, finishing it off...  then suddenly finding himself plummeting to the ground.  The fall dropped him below zero hit points, but we healed him before he could share Woil's fate.  The surviving Roc decided it had eaten enough, and flew away.

We (finally) finished our rest and continued our hike.  Eventually we reached a 100-foot rope bridge.  We were concerned the bridge might not hold our weight, so we tried going across one at a time and used some of our rope to reinforce it.  As it turned out, the bridge's structural integrity wasn't the problem.  No, the real challenge was the flock of pterodactyls that attacked anyone who tried to cross.  Luckily they weren't nearly as powerful as the Rocs, and we didn't lose any more party members.

Kill it with fire!

Our guide, Vikao, joined the party as we continued on our quest.  After the bridge, we reached a plateau and started following a river.  One night, while camping by the river, we were attacked by three trolls.  Demethius and Zuul were once again on watch (we've got to stop letting them watch).  The trolls managed to knock out Demethius before he even knew they were there, and he stayed near death through much of the fight.  Having been asleep, some of the party members weren't in their armor, which is never a great thing when facing trolls.  Keyleth used her favorite fire spell against one of the trolls, and spent the rest of the battle moving the fire around.  One of the trolls quickly realized she was responsible for this burning sensation, and punished her harshly.  Though bruised and battered, Keyleth got the last laugh when her spell eventually finished him off.

Troll Soccer

Steif decapitated another troll, which is a pretty mean feat considering he was using his fists.  However, the headless troll continued to fight, and the troll-less head continued to bite anyone who came near.  Steif tried to drop-kick the troll head, but instead the head ended up chomping on the Monk's ankles.  Steif spent the next few rounds wrestling the surprisingly agile head.  As the fight continued, both head and body started to regenerate into full trolls.  Another troll's severed arm also threatened to regenerate into an additional monster, but we didn't let it get far.  There were a lot of ups and downs in this fight, but eventually we got all the trolls down long enough to finish them off with fire.  We camped again and ended the session.

Reminders:
We might not play next Saturday 10/19, as our DM is scheduled to run a game at Nashville Comic-Con.  I will not be able to make it on 10/26 or 11/2, but there might not be a game on 11/2 anyway.

LFG: Monkey Business

Game Date: 10/05/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 14
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Baer "Halfbeard" (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius the Holder of Actions (James) - Human Cleric
Doran of Clan Hawk (Eddie) - Human Barbarian
Jared (Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus the Verminslayer (James, subbing for Thomas) - Human Monk
Woil Xurcaine (Daniel) - Gnome Wizard
Zuul the Designated Punching Bag (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:

Keyleth's Favorite Spell

We're still exploring this island, searching for an ancient artifact in a lost city.  While on watch one day, Zuul and Demethius encountered some Aranea in the trees.  Since most of us were asleep, we started the battle at a disadvantage, complicated even further as the spider creatures fired webbing at us.  At one point Doran (who's still level 1) was taken down to 2 hit points, causing his fiancee Keyleth to lose her temper and kill his attacker.  This was the first of many times Keyleth defended her betrothed this session.  She's going to have a tough time keeping him alive until the wedding.

More resting, more wandering.  One day we encountered an aggressive tribe of apes.  One of them gave Woil a big hug. Zuul tried to scare them off with a mighty roar.  And it worked... sort of.  They apes ran off, still carrying Woil with them.  Our party chased after them, working our way over rough terrain, and dodging the rocks they threw at us.  One of Zuul's spells had the side effect of causing a loud peal of thunder.  The sound attracted the attention of a much larger ape.  It was a rough fight, but we got through it.  Woil cast the spell that finished off the big one, and we wiped out the remaining apes within a couple of rounds.

Damn dirty apes!

Later we heard the sound of something chasing something else.  We investigated just in time to see the tails of some giant lizards running by, but we didn't try to draw them into a fight.  Another night we were accosted by a bunch of monkeys.  They weren't much of a threat in battle, but they were quite annoying in that they kept trying to steal our equipment.  We wiped them out and went back to bed.  A couple of hours later, the smell of dead monkey attracted four more apes.  It wasn't a long fight, but it was yet another one where sleeping party members had to join the fight late.

Another day, we found some humanoid tracks.  We followed them to a group of neanderthals.  Zuul and Barad greeted the primitive people, who spoke in broken common.  We asked them if they knew where we could find the city we sought, and they agreed to lead us to the bridge to the city.  We followed them for a few hours.  We saw more monkeys, but we just ran past them while they threw feces at us.  That may be the first time I've used the word "feces" on this blog.  A bit further, a giant spider suddenly burst out of a mountain crag, killing one of our neanderthal guides.

Not really a squid.  This time.

We fought several giant spiders, with a cliff wall on one side and a drop-off on the other.  The spiders had the advantage of being able to climb the walls and attack us from the sides.  The best moment was when Woil, having spotted a spider climbing up the cliff below us, used a grease spell to make the spider fall to its death.  After the battle, we continued for a few more hours, when we met some exiles from Doran's tribe.  They were friendly, and allowed us to camp with them.

We ended the session there.  We're at the camp, but we haven't actually taken an extended rest yet.

LFG: Birthday Bash

Game Date: 9/28/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 13
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Baer "Halfbeard" (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius the Holder of Actions (James) - Human Cleric
Doran of Clan Hawk (Eddie) - Human Barbarian
Jared (Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus (Thomas) - Human Monk
Woil Xurcaine (Daniel) - Gnome Wizard
Zuul the Punching Bag (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
Last session we killed a gaggle of pirates, and sent a bunch more running.  After freeing the villagers they'd captured, we worried that the fleeing galleon might attack our own ship.  We spent a fair amount of time debating on whether to use the remaining canoes to return to our ship, or trek through the forest, or even split the party and do both.  We picked the forest, with Zuul staying behind to protect the villagers until our return.  It turned out we were worried for nothing, as our ship's captain hadn't even seen the pirates.

Taking The Long Way

We sailed back to the village of Tanaroa, and returned the former captives back to their people.  Chieftess Mira made us honorary members of the island tribes, and asked a special favor of Keyleth.  As part of her induction into Clan Hawk, she asked Keyleth to marry Mira's cousin Doran.  Keyleth asked for some time to think about it.  In the meantime, Doran has joined the party, so he and Keyleth can get to know each other better.

The rest of the party each got to pick their clan:  Hawk, Elk, Tiger, or Turtle.  Between all our party members, we have all four clans covered.  We spent a week in the village, after which the islanders gave us some rations, took us as far as they could, and wished us luck.  Thus began the first of what will probably be several sessions, exploring the jungles of this island in search of an artifact.  We have planned a circuitous route around the island, starting at the outer areas and spiraling inward, in order to cover the ground most thoroughly.

Sleeping Near The Enemy

After a day or two we encountered a pair of dinosaurs with club-like tails.  We approached them cautiously, but they didn't attack so neither did we.  The following day we were camping when a dozen Bugbears tried to sneak up on us.  Luckily Zuul and Demethius were keeping careful watch, and spotted the Bugbears before they could kill us in our sleep.  Zuul attempted to intimidate them before the attack, but he just wasn't scary enough.  He got surrounded right off, taking a beating while the rest of us woke up and got to our feet.  Still, it wasn't that bad a fight.  We got a few bruises and used several healing spells, but the Bugbears didn't last too many rounds.

This Cake Is Not A Lie

After that we spent a couple of more days trekking through the jungle.  One day we were walking along when seven huge spiders came at us.  To be honest, I don't remember much about this battle because that's when the surprise party started.  My wife suddenly showed up in the Game Keep's back room with several of my friends, bearing a cake to celebrate my 40th birthday.  My character used her favorite flame spell on the spiders, and the other players were kind enough to roll my dice when I couldn't pay attention.  But from what I can tell, we defeated the spiders pretty quickly.  After that, we took an extended rest and called it a day.

LFG: This Wall Is On Fiiiiiiiiiiiiire...

Game Date: 9/21/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 12
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

The Party:
Baer "Halfbeard" (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius (James) - Human Cleric
Jared (Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus (Thomas) - Human Monk
Woil Xurcaine (Daniel) - Gnome Wizard
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
So, we're on a tropical island, in the village of Tanaroa, hoping to eventually search some ruins for a pearl.  But that's on the back burner for now, as we're still trying to endear ourselves to chieftess Mira.  Her brother - or possibly cousin (a confusion I will attribute to inbreeding) - has been captured by pirates.  Mira believed he was being held in a pirate cove on a nearby island.  We agreed to attempt a rescue.

As we sailed around all the tiny reefs and sandbars, our ship got caught in some sort of web.  The captain was nonchalant, "It's just sea spiders."  Oh, thank goodness, is that all.  We managed to cut the ship free and continued the trip.  We approached the pirate island with too little subtlety, and their galleon attacked us with its catapults.  We turned the ship around and fled with our tails between our legs. 

But eventually we did manage to take some landing boats and make landfall about fifteen miles from the pirate cove.  Due to the heat, we waited until nightfall to travel.  Around morning we reached the pirate cove.  It was a walled-in compound consisting of about sixteen huts, opening up onto a beach.  It had three watchtowers, and the wall was covered in thorns.  Once again we waited until nightfall so we could attack under cover.

While waiting for sundown, Zuul and Keyleth went foraging and were ambushed by five dire rats.  It wasn't much of a fight. When the sun finally set, we sneaked up to the outer wall and started attacking one section.  After about a round we managed to break through, but the pirates were alerted to our presence.  Most of the battle was clustered around that entry point.  Demethius set large sections of the wall on fire in order to give us more ways in.  We spent a good portion of the fight tracking which sections of the wall had taken damage from the flaming thorns.

As wave after wave of pirates stormed out of their huts to attack us, we faced several moments of peril.  A couple of us went down more than once, and we burned many healing spells and potions to stay on our feet.  About halfway through the encounter, Keyleth started using her Flame Orb spell, making her feel useful for the first time this battle... until her spell set fire to a hut that contained some of the pirates' prisoners.  Zuul bravely rushed through the enemy lines to rescue the captives.

It was a very long battle.  All told we faced forty-three pirates and their leader.  We killed or captured about half of them; the other half fled to the beach and escaped in their rowboats.  While a couple of us came very close to death, we all survived the battle.  After the fight, we found more captives tied up in huts, including Mira's brother/cousin.  We also found a few treasures, including a Ring of Waterwalking.  We ended the session there.

LFG: Why Did It Have To Be Snakes?

Game Date: 9/14/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 11
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Baer "Halfbeard" (Bryan, subbing for Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Barad Stronghollow (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius (James) - Human Cleric
Jared (Rob) - Elf Druid
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif Tartaus (Thomas) - Human Monk
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
We've been given a mission to travel to an island and find a mysterious black pearl.  After a lot of preparation, we finally set sail on board a ship called the "Unlucky Halfling", named after its captain.  We spent nearly two weeks at sea, facing a couple of storms and some minor challenges.  On the thirteenth day, as we approached the island, we hit a reef.

While the crew worked on repairs, Halfbeard, Barad, and Zuul went clam diving.  They found a few pearls, but their activity also attracted several large water snakes.  They were unarmored to make swimming easier, which of course meant the snakes had an easy time hitting them.  They were bitten, grappled, and dragged underwater.  Steif jumped in after them, while the rest of us fired at the snakes from the ship, letting loose the occasional healing spell.

It was a difficult fight, and the divers took a lot of damage.  Zuul fared the worst, and for a minute we thought he was a lost cause.  But Barad managed to save his life at the last second, and eventually everyone made it out of the water.  Low on spells and hit dice, we took an extended rest before going any further.  We sailed around the reef and made landfall at the village of Mora.

The village elder, Wan of Clan Hawk, invited us to a feast.  Then she asked us to travel to their sister village of Tanaroa, and meet with the chieftess Mira.  It was a large group of us making the trip, with all our guides and henchmen.  Due to the tropical heat, we had to make a lot of endurance checks, and it was slow going.

We encountered a group of pirate slavers, but it wasn't a difficult battle.  The only hard part was that a lot of us were fighting at disadvantage, due to endurance failures.  We kept the last pirate alive so we could interrogate her. We took their armor because light armors are less exhausting in this heat.  Sweating bullets, we took another extended rest and made the rest of the trek in the cool of night.

Eventually we reached Tanaroa and explored the town.  It was home to four clans, each represented by an animal: Hawk, Elk, Tiger, and Turtle.  It was mostly a normal tribal town, with a religion based on ancestor worship.  The one odd thing that stood out was that they used zombies for labor.  But there wasn't any evil intent to the process.

Just so we wouldn't have to be too far from our ship, we sent an animal messenger to the Halfling captain, requesting that he bring the ship around and dock closer to Tanaroa.  Now that we were all refreshed and ready for adventure, we ended the session.  Next week our search will really begin.

LFG: Squid Happens

Game Date: 9/7/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 10
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Barad (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Demethius (James) - Human Cleric
Flip (Eddie, subbing for Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Halfbeard (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Keyleth (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steve (Daniel, subbing for Thomas) - Human Monk
Woil (Daniel) - Gnome Wizard
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
I missed session 9, in which they cleared out a few more rooms in the Lost Temple. They encountered a powerful Wight who gave them clues to complete the dungeon.  They fought a grey ooze, which damaged Halfbeard's weapon.  They also fought some rats, Zuul collected some tapestries, and they kept hearing a ghostly xylophone sound.

This week began with us barely avoiding a blade trap.  We entered one room and found the body of a dead Dwarf, reaching toward a pool of water in the center of the room.  The room also contained a giant toad statue, which came to life and attacked Barad.  Once we killed the toad, we looted the Dwarf and found a map, along with some notes about a mysterious island.  More on that later.

Another room contained six statues of female warriors.  On the opposite side of the room was a bricked-up doorway.  As we entered the room, the statues requested that we identify ourselves.  Since it was his church, Zuul took the lead and told them of his mission.  The statues parted, and a speaker over the doorway asked Zuul a history question.  He gave the correct answer, and the bricks opened up to allow us to proceed.

In the next room was a giant statue of a dragon, holding a book.  While Zuul read the book, the rest of us explored the room until we found a secret door.  The secret room held the shield we had been sent to find.  One final puzzle requested that we "prove that you are Halav's friend."  Since Halav was cremated, the correct answer was to produce flames.  Out-of-character, none of us figured it out, but the DM gave it to us due to some high religion checks.  Our Cleric used a flame spell, and the shield was ours.

But wait - Zuul and Barad each wanted this artifact for their own church.  We had a neutral party member carry the shield until we got back to town, then we voted on whether to give the shield to Barad or Zuul.  Although it meant a much smaller monetary reward, we gave it to Zuul because it was more closely related to his religion.  He took it to his church, and they requested he hold on to it a bit longer.  They asked us to take it to their main church in the capital city.

We were smuggled on board a Gnome-run riverboat called the "Prancing Queen".  It was a four-day voyage, with stops at a few towns along the way.   On board we met the Gnome Wizard Woil, who joined our party.  It was a relaxing cruise filled with fun and gambling.

Release the Kraken!

One night, while Halfbeard, Flip, and Barad were up on deck, several giant tentacles burst out of the water.  The paddle boat was being attacked by a giant squid.  Tentacles grabbed several passengers and crew members, dragging them beneath the waves to their deaths.  As the party members above decks attacked the tendrils, the rest of us made our way past the fleeing passengers to join the fight.

It was an exciting battle.  Several party members were grappled at various points during the battle, some getting dragged underwater to fight the squid itself.  Flip was brought very near death, at one point getting accosted by two tentacles at once.  Woil managed to push the monster away from the boat using a Thunderwave spell, while other party members used automated Gnomish rescue boats to retrieve some of the overboard party members.

Battling underwater, it was Barad who dealt the final death blow, using some fancy shmancy Paladin power.  The ship's captain was very appreciative of our service, and invited us to a fine dinner featuring calamari.  Our ship was detained a bit to assess the need for repairs, so we didn't reach the capital city until after midnight.  Nevertheless, we headed straight to the church and woke up the staff.  They were a little bit miffed until they saw the shield.  Then we were heroes.

We were given rooms at the best inn in town, and invited to a conference the following morning.  Reasoning that this shield should be used for heroic deeds rather than sit in some cathedral gathering dust, they decided that Zuul should keep it to protect him in battle.  During the debriefing, Zuul gave them the map and notes we'd found on the dead Dwarf.  They looked over the notes and gave us a new quest.

We've been tasked with finding a black pearl hidden on an island.  They gave us 3500 gold to buy supplies for the mission.  We debated a bit on whether to rent a boat or buy one, finally deciding to buy it.  We'll be ready to set sail next session.  Hopefully we won't see any more squid.

LFG: The Lost Temple

Game Date: 8/24/2013
Location: The Game Keep
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 8
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Barad (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Damithus (James) - Human Cleric
Flip (Graham, subbing for Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Halfbeard (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Steif (Thomas) - Human Monk
Tamel (Andrew) - Elf Ranger
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
Our two Paladins, Zuul and Barad, belong to different churches.  Each church wants us to go on the same mission: to find the Lost Temple and return the "Shield of Halav".  For now that means we're all on the same side, but what will happen once we find the shield?  Looks like there could be some in-party conflict coming up.  Can't wait!

"Many Bothans died to bring us this map."

Zuul's church gave us a blood-soaked map to guide us through the Lost Temple.  During our trek through the woods to reach the temple, we encountered a party of nineteen griffons, but Barad talked our way out of that one by telling them about our quest.  When we reached the site of the temple, we were attacked by some skeletons.  After defeating them, we found a hole in the ground, with stairs leading down into the temple.

In the first hallway of the temple, we saw a face on the wall.  It said, "Greetings visitors.  Kneel and knock."  We didn't do either fast enough, and a pit opened up beneath our feet.  Halfbeard, Steve, and Barad fell into the pit, and the party was attacked by giant ants.  We killed two of them, but the final ant fled down a hallway.  We explored the adjoining room and studied our map.  The map was a bit confusing at first because we assumed the face we'd seen was the one drawn on the map, and therefore thought we were in the NorthEast corner when we were actually in the SouthEast.  But then we started finding more faces - each with their own vague warnings - and the map made sense again.

In the hallway marked "Sounds Bad", we fought several bats.  In the next room we fought some fire beetles, followed by more bats in the room after that.  Steve, the party monk, proved to be an incredible damage machine, often pulverizing two enemies each turn.  We found a library and looted some of the books.  A face in one hallway told us we needed to find a certain relic to go any further, so we turned back.

Dead ant... Dead ant... Dead ant dead ant dead ant...

The final battle of the day took place in a large worship room, where we fought four ants (including the one that had fled earlier).  Zuul rushed in first and quickly found himself surrounded by three of the giant insects, while the fourth ant went into the hallway and blocked us from helping him.  Halfbeard took a lot of damage before chasing the ant back into the room.  Despite this early setback, it was not a difficult battle and we didn't have too much trouble exterminating the creatures.

Once the ants were all dead, we took a short rest in the worship room and ended the session.  There's still plenty of temple to explore.

Afterthoughts: 
The most recent playtest update brought in a lot of changes.  My character was nerfed to the point that I've had to change my entire combat strategy.  No more morphing into a bear and barrelling through every encounter, at least not until level 6.  That doesn't leave me with a whole lot.  I've got a couple of decent spells, but I don't get very many per day, and I prefer to save what I've got to heal people.  Which leaves me with my bow, but I'm not that great a shot.  I wish the Druid had one good cantrip I could use as a bread-and-butter ranged spell, like the Wizard's Ray of Frost.

But they weren't just picking on the Druid.  They nerfed most classes to some extent, because they wanted to stretch out the early levels and give us a more old school experience.  That's fine for nostalgic players who want to relive their games from the 70s, but I didn't get into RPGs until the 90s and I greatly prefer the modern improvements.  What's next?  Are they going to bring back THAC0 and have races as classes? 

Look, I understand nostalgia.  I still have an irrational fondness for 8-bit Nintendo games.  It reminds me of a simpler time in my life, when I had fewer responsibilities and a lot more time for fun.  But that doesn't mean I want them to stop improving modern graphics and only use primitive sprites from now on.  There's a reason we don't still listen to music on vinyl.  MP3s are more convenient, take up less space, don't degrade, and have more consistent sound quality.  Some modern advancements are simply better.

And if they want to keep the old school stuff as an option, great!  Have a version of the game that appeals to the veterans, but also have options that keep things interesting for the more easily-distracted modern gamers.  They've been saying from the beginning that they were going to have lots of optional rules in the hopes of pleasing everyone, so this is one place where that would be very appropriate.

Moving on...  They removed skills almost entirely, replacing them with straight ability checks.  Frankly, that sucks.  Skills represent practice.  Not everyone is good at climbing just because they're strong, some people are good because they practiced the skill.  This takes out so much customization.  Now you'll almost always be able to predict what skills a person has based on their class.  Okay, to some extent that's always been true (ever met a rogue who couldn't sneak?) but now they're just throwing creativity out the window.

I'm told that there's only going to be one more publicly-released update for the playtest, and after that they're going to start being more secretive.  That makes sense - you don't want to give out free copies of of it too close to completion.  Otherwise there's less incentive to buy the actual game when it comes out.

My prediction is that the September update is also going to have even more radical changes, but that none of these last few updates are actually indicative of the final product.  Right now they just want to show us as many different versions of the game as possible, to see which ideas get the best feedback  So it makes sense to make each update as drastic as possible.

My next prediction is that the players won't understand this at all.  They're going to expect the final product to be a tweaked version of the September update, rather than a compilation of the most popular ideas from all the updates.  People seem to think each playtest update is supposed to represent an improvement on the last set of rules, rather than different examples of possible options.  When the September update comes out, half the players are going to scream and rant and rave about how stupid 5e is going to be.  Then, when the final product comes out, the other half of the players are going to scream and rant and rave about how it's nothing like that excellent September update.

You gotta love gamers.

LFG: The Bells of Saint Elwyn

Game Date: 8/3/2013
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 7
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Barad (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Flip (Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Halfbeard (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Nameless Pregen (Mike) - Elf Wizard
Tamel (Devin, subbing for Andrew) - Elf Ranger
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session:
When we left off last week, we had just killed a young black dragon while searching for a stolen bell.  A couple of our party members attempted to skin the dragon for its hide, but were unsuccessful.  However, they did manage to rescue a wizard who was trapped in the dragon's belly, and the wizard joined our party.  The next room had several curtained niches, each with a painting depicting a robed woman in various scenes.  The woman was Elwyn, who had stolen the bell we were tasked with rescuing.

At the far end of the room was a pedestal, upon which sat the bell.  After some discussion, Tamel ran up and grabbed the bell.  Immediately the party was attacked by two gargoyles and two shadows.  The gargoyles swooped in first, attacking Tamel from both sides and dropping him quickly.  Several other party members were up and down over the course of the fight, but Tamel spent the most time waiting for aid.  Later in the fight, Flip stepped out into the hallway to get a better vantage point.  There he ran into Elwyn, who joined the battle. 

It was a tough fight, but luckily the DM had a few bad die rolls.  Eventually we killed the gargoyles and shadows, and got all our party members back on their feet.  Then it was the seven of us against Elwyn, which was pretty good odds despite her high AC.  We finished her off, leaving her alive so we could collect a larger reward.  Then we rested and headed back to town.

Reminders:
We collected 1642 gold each.  We are not playing this campaign the next two weeks, so our next game should be on 8/24.  A controversial new playtest packet update was released last night, but it was short notice so we didn't use it today.  That should give us time to rebuild our characters using the updated rules.

LFG: Spiral of the Bells

Game Date: 7/27/2013
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 6
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Barad (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Flip (Jeremy, subbing for Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Halfbeard (Jeremy, subbing for Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Tamel (Matt, subbing for Andrew) - Elf Ranger
Zuul (Matt, subbing for Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

Recap: 
Once again I missed a session.  While I was out last week, the party was offered three different quests.  Barad's church asked us to retrieve a bell.  Zuul's church gave him a mission of his own, but he is forbidden from telling rest of the party what it is.  Tamel was asked to deliver a package somewhere far to the North of the city.  We started with the bell mission.  The party sneaked into a castle, and an iron door slammed shut behind them.  We found an iron bell, then fought six well-armored clerics.  We barely survived the battle, and used most of our healing resources in the process.

The Session:
We had a low turnout today, so we didn't do a whole lot.  We explored a few more halls of this castle, which seem to be spiraling inward.  We found a few more bells this session, and we've kept all of them, just in case.  But I'm betting the bell we actually need is at the center of the spiral.

First we found a copper bell, then a brass bell.  Down another hall we encountered a wood golem.  Barad threw a torch at the creature, starting the fight.  The golem only took half damage from our attacks, but there were six of us, so he still only lasted a couple of rounds.

Around the next corner we found a silver bell.  Then we saw a statue.  Zuul rolled a religion check, but wasn't sure what he was looking at.  We sent Flip to check it out, and he was promptly hit in the face with a blast of magma.  Once we destroyed the magma-spewing statue, we heard a voice mocking Zuul's religious knowledge.

A bit farther on we saw a statue of a horse.  Again our knowledge checks yielded nothing, and we decided to just walk around this one.  Next we found a gold bell.  A little later we came across a small black dragon, fast asleep.  We debated a little on whether to sneak by, kill it, or talk to it.  Finally we had Flip attempt to sneak up and give it a coup de grace, but the dragon woke up before he reached it.  Since it didn't attack right away, we tried talking to it.

"Mmm... snacks!  Crunchy, crunchy snacks!" it said.  We tried diplomacy, but the dragon wouldn't allow us to pass without a bribe.  It requested 500 gold pieces per person, which was more than we were willing to pay.  When we refused, the dragon blasted us with acid breath.  It was a tough fight, and the party lost a lot of hit points, but we did survive.

After the battle, Keyleth expended the rest of her spells healing the party, so we decided to take an extended rest.  We found a safe-looking alcove and got comfortable.  Then we heard a woman's voice laughing, and a gate dropped from the ceiling, trapping us in the alcove.  There was a key in a keyhole on the wall opposite the alcove, and the mysterious voice told us we could get out if we could reach it.  Luckily, Keyleth had recently leveled up, and now had a rat form.   She skittered through the bars and raised the gate.  Then we took our extended rest, and ended the session there.

Reminders: 
So far we will be playing next week, but we won't be playing this campaign on 8/10 or 8/17.

LFG: Two Wights Don't Make a Wrong (Sorry)

Game Date: 7/13/2013
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 4
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Barad (Jeremy) - Dwarf Paladin
Halfbeard (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Flip (DM, subbing for Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Tamel (Cliff, subbing for Andrew) - Elf Ranger
Zuul (DM, subbing for Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

Recap: 
We'd been tasked with clearing the squatters out of a mansion, so the new owner could safely take possession of the property.  We'd explored nearly every inch of the building, and only had a handful of challenges left before us:  A gelatinous cube in one room, some giant wasps in another, a locked door we couldn't open, a vengeful doppelganger running around, and the fact that we were trapped in the basement with no visible exit.

The Session:
When we left off last week, we had just defeated some hobgoblins.  Under a pile of treasure, we discovered Barad, who had been tied up and badly beaten.  We introduced ourselves and he agreed to join us.  When we opened up the door to leave the room, we found the doorway was blocked by the gelatinous cube we'd been putting off fighting.  Convenient.

We fought the cube in the doorway.  It didn't seem as dangerous as the cubes in previous editions of D&D.  No one got engulfed, though Barad was injured pretty badly.  Once we killed the cube, we found a magic dagger in its remains.  We gave the dagger to our party rogue.  We continued down the hall, and found the next door had been spiked shut.  We assume it was the doppelganger we've been chasing around this basement.  We managed to push it back open and kept going.

Last session we passed a locked door with an ornate keyhole.  We'd recently found a key, so we headed back to see if it was the right one.  The key unlocked the door quite easily.  Inside, there was some glowing treasure in one corner.  We sent Flip to check it out, and he vanished when he got near it.  We experimented a little with some rope to find out if he'd been disintegrated or just teleported.  Unable to know for sure either way, we finally just said "what the heck" and followed the rogue. 

We were transported into a room with walls lined by sarcophagi.  Barad used his channel divinity power to detect undead, and we learned that two of the coffins contained something evil.  We decided to save those two for last.  We opened the coffins one at a time, having the rogue check them for traps.  The one time the rogue rolled a 1, it turned out to be trapped, but luckily our heroes were not harmed by the acid spray.  Most of the sarcophagi contained treasure, and we wound up with a big pile of coins to divide. We also found a map that promised to show us the way out of the basement.

The last two coffins each contained a wight.  These monsters are bad news for a first-level party, but our paladins managed to obliterate them with channel divinity spells before they had a chance to mess us up.  (Though we did have to take an extended rest between the first and second wights in order to regain the power.)  One of the coffins activated the portal to teleport us back to the previous room.

At this point, there was only one room we'd passed on, which contained four giant wasps.  We'd promised to clear out the entire mansion, so we were obligated to do this last bit of pest control.  Keyanna turned into a bear and charged into the room, only to roll badly and get swarmed.  She hit zero hit points twice this encounter, but she also managed to do her fair share of damage in the fight.

Our mission now complete (with the possible exception of the missing doppelganger), we examined the map to figure out how to get out of here.  We returned to the room where the trapdoor had been, and found a brick on the floor.  There was a hole in the wall where the brick had been, in which we found a piece of paper.  It was a short note directed at Tamel, and we can only assume it was written by the doppelganger.  It was nothing particularly informative, just a brief statement of disrespect, expressed in the eloquent style we'd come to expect from the doppelganger.

We played with the brick and the hole (no giggling), and heard a click whenever it was inserted or removed.  But we couldn't figure out how that helped us, so we consulted with the map once again, paying more attention this time.  It directed us to go to the Eastern corridor and chant some magic words.  Doing so opened up a new corridor, which eventually led us into the woods outside the mansion.

Tamel searched for the doppelganger's tracks.  He did find some barefoot humanoid tracks leading from the exit to the road leading to town.  Due to an extended rest we'd taken earlier, we knew the doppelganger had a huge lead on us, but we still rushed in hopes of catching up to it.  Keyanna turned into a horse and carried two of the party members, and the trio reached town well before the rest of the party.

Once the party was reunited, we received our payment from Caldwell, divided our treasure, and took advantage of the hospitality granted by Barad's church.  Next session we will find a new mission to keep us busy.  I still wonder if we'll ever see that doppelganger again, though.  He seems to have a personal grudge against Tamel, which could come back to haunt us.

TL;DR Version:
We finished clearing out the mansion and collected our reward.  Next week we'll pick up a new plot hook.

LFG: A Tale of Two Tamels

Game Date: 7/6/2013
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 3
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Flip (Trevor) - Halfling Rogue
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid
Tamel (Andrew) - Elf Ranger
Zuul (Graham) - Half-Orc Paladin

The Session: 
I missed the last session.  I'm told we hired a couple of new characters and cleared out the first level of the mansion.  We were unable to open one magically-sealed door, so we headed back to town.

We reported our progress to Clifton Caldwell, the mansion's owner.  Finding herself short on help, Keyleth brought on more new party members.  She set out for the mansion with Flip, Tamel, Zuul, and a wizard we hired to open the door for us.  The final room had a trap door, which we opened and descended to the basement.  Once we were at the bottom of the stairs, the trap door disappeared behind us, turning into a solid ceiling.

An elf approached us and asked for our help finding a relic.  Naturally we were suspicious, and besides, we had a job to do.  When we refused to come with him, he offered to show us another exit.  We didn't trust him, so we tied him up and took him with us while we explored the level.  The next room we entered contained a couple of cultists.  We thought about trying diplomacy, but our Half-Orc Paladin failed his Charisma check, and they went on the offensive.  The cultists kicked things off with a sleep spell, immediately taking Tamel and Flip out of the fight.

In bear form, Keyleth rushed in and attacked, failing to impress them by rolling 1's and 2's for the next three rounds.  But when she finally hit, it was a good one.  Once the cultists were dead, we went to revive our sleeping companions.  We quickly discovered Tamel was missing, along with our elf captive.  A few minutes later, Tamel came walking around the corner.  Shortly after that, another Tamel came walking around the corner, this one accusing the first Tamel of being an imposter.

We attacked the closest one, initially just trying to restrain him but doing more damage when he fought back.  When we finally knocked him unconscious, he reverted to his natural form, revealing him to be a doppelganger.  We continued exploring the basement, dragging the tied-up doppelganger with us.  We found one room with some giant wasps, but skipped it for now.  We also found a couple of empty rooms, and one with a lock that we could not pick.

 A few rooms later, we opened a door to find a gelatinous cube.  We shut the door on it and decided to deal with that later.  In another area, we fought four humans.  Afterwards, we found a lot of coins and our paladin looted a nifty new sword.  Unfortunately, during the fight/looting, the doppelganger managed to slip his bonds and sneak away.  In the next room, we fought three hobgoblins, killing them before they had much chance to react.  On one of their corpses we found a key that hopefully fits the door we passed earlier.  We ended the session there.

Reminders:
Next session we'll probably start by trying our key in that locked room.  If we're truly to do our job thoroughly, we also need to kill the gelatinous cube and the wasps.  We'll need to be wary of more ambushes from the doppelganger.  And of course, we also need to find an exit, seeing as how our trap door has wandered off.

LFG: More Playtesting

Game Date: 6/22/2013
Campaign: Looking For A Group, Session 1
System: D&D Next / 5e Playtest
DM: Rusty

Players:
Golag Bonesmasher (Bryan) - Half-Orc Ranger
Halfbeard (Cliff) - Dwarf Fighter
Keyleth Siannodel (Matt) - Elf Druid

The Session: 
We're still trying to gather enough players to make a stable campaign.  Today we played a session of the D&D Next playtest, and plan to continue this story next week.  All three of us created our characters from scratch, there at the table.  It took a little while, but it was still faster than most editions.

We started in the village of Threshold, where we asked around for rumors and work.  We learned of several potential jobs.  The one we picked was an eviction.  There was a castle down the road that had been unoccupied for a few years.  The new owner wanted us to drive out some goblin squatters.

On the road there, we ran into a man who was suspiciously interested in our business.  Or he was just genuinely friendly.  It's hard to tell.  But being paranoid genre savvy players, we assume he'll be a major villain later in the campaign.

We reached the castle and went inside.  In the first room we found four goblins, and dispatched them quickly.  We left the last one alive to ask him questions, but he wasn't much help.  We tied him up and left him in the corner, revisiting him occasionally to ask him more questions.

When we interrupted the goblins, they had been sorting their treasure, so there were piles of silver and copper pieces in the middle of the room.  We were wary of filling our bags with heavy coins in the very first room, hoping for better treasure later.  So we covered up the coins in the hopes of gathering them on the way out.  We did pocket a valuable gem, though.

In some other rooms we encountered three humans.  They claimed to be tradesmen, resting on their way to town.  According to them, lots of traveling merchants use this abandoned castle to rest.  We found this a little hard to swallow considering the goblin infestation, but we gave them the benefit of the doubt.  We ordered them to leave in the morning, and we rested overnight.  True to their word, they left in the morning.

The traders had encountered a couple of wolves and locked them in the castle courtyard.  Golag used his animal empathy spell on one of them, and the other one came along as well.  We continued opening doors but didn't find much to write home about.  In one room we fought a few stirges, but took them out pretty quickly.  We ended the session there.  It looks like we've investigated maybe a third of the castle.  But character creation took up a significant portion of the session, so we could still finish out the castle next session.

Afterthoughts:
I chose Druid on a whim.  I have a small amount of experience with Druids in 4e, but for the most part it was new to me.   I mostly stayed in animal form and fought melee.  In Elven form, I tried using my bow a couple of times, but I kept missing.  I've yet to cast a spell.  I'm still not a fan of Vancian magic, and it was difficult to choose which spells to prepare.  But overall I'm happy with my Druid; it seems like a pretty versatile class.

I really enjoyed the session, but I'm still torn on what I want out of D&D Next.  On one hand, I'd like it to be the "definitive" version of D&D.  On the other hand, some of the newfangled stuff they're throwing in is pretty cool.  For example, one of the first significant rules introduced in 5e was Advantage/Disadvantage system (roll two d20s and take the higher or lower depending on what's going on).  I really like this idea, and it works great in practice.  But I think I would have liked it better in 4e than in 5e. It just seems to fit 4e's flashy style.

So this is where I debate with myself.  Half of me wants 5e to be like one of the retroclones, with a half-page character sheet and simple characters that can be built in five minutes.  Something similar to first edition, but more balanced and no hint of THACO.  The kind of thing they tried to do with Dungeon Crawl Classics or Castles and Crusades, but with official "D&D" branding.

My other half wants them to throw in every neat idea they can think of, as long as most of it is optional.  I could even see making "basic" and "advanced" versions of the rules (gee, that sounds familiar).  You could get by with just the 40 page "Basic Rulebook" that doesn't even include backgrounds or specialties.  But to get the most out of the system, you'd pick up the "Deluxe/Advanced Rulebook" which has everything.  But I don't know if it would be in WOTC's best interests to divide their fans up even further.

I've heard some grumblings that the game is too easy.  I know they've spent a lot of time trying to configure hit points and healing.  The problem is, the amount of health needed really depends on whether your campaign is roleplay-heavy or mostly combat.  A single system isn't going to satisfy all D&D campaigns.  Some games are going to have one fight a day (or less), and the DMs are going to say, "These guys never get low on hit points!  There's no drama!"  Other games are going to have 10 fights a day as the characters work their way through dungeons room by room, and people are going to complain that the slow healing really bogs the game down.

So IMO, D&DNext's biggest failing might turn out to be the options they've promised.  They act like they want it to be the one and only, end all be all, all things to all people, ultimate universal gaming system.  The problem is there's no way to really do that.  They can give all kinds of optional healing systems, but it will take more than that to balance the game for different play styles.  This is something that affects all aspects of combat, from monster hit points to attack rolls and AC.  Even within the realm of high combat, there's tweaking to be done.  Do you want your session to consist of lots of short battles, or two or three really long fights?  Sooner or later they may have to pick a target audience and cater to them.  Otherwise they could end up with a product that nobody wants.