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.