Tyranny of Dragons - Session 2

And we had our second session! And we're about to have another one tonight! I'm almost falling behind posting these. I'll probably continue to throw in some random DM thoughts as it comes up, but will try to stick to plot where possible. We'll pick up where we left off with the characters just arriving into the keep of Greenest and being ushered inside the tower itself.

Once inside, they were greeted by a large room filled with villagers.  The scene looked like a refugee camp, with acolytes of various deities helping the people who looked injured. Adolphus and Gwen sped off to help the injured townsfolk as well, but being already depleted on their spell slots, they were limited to mostly non-magical healing. The injured players (somewhat selfishly) sought help from some of the acolytes and the more persuasive of the bunch received healing potions. The goal from my DM perspective here was to allow the players an opportunity to heal up to full health (since they're first level), but not just give it to them. Hence the persuasion checks, and potions of healing rather than, "And you're all full health now."

A red-haired dwarf bursts into the room, the sound of alarms and joining battle blaring from behind him. He glances around the room quickly, before settling his gaze, and his finger, on you. He approaches while saying, "You. The sally port has been breached. I need you help reseal it. Please help us."

The characters quickly heeded the call and rushed back out into the courtyard to find kobolds, raiders, and a few cultists engaged with the guards. The red-haired dwarf led the characters past the intruders to just outside of the ready-room of the sally port. He charged in saying, "In here! We have to seal the breach! Fight our way in!"

The ready room was nearly full with six kobolds, two ambush drakes, and a couple of spell-casters (cult acolytes) in dark robes in the back of the group. The ambush drakes acted first and attacked the two monks who were in front of the party, each dealing seven damage. Throughout this encounter, I rolled really well for the monsters and fairly mediocre for the dwarf helping the characters. Unfortunately it made the encounter significantly harder than I intended. But the characters came out on top after a tough battle.

Combat continued as the characters slowly chipped away at the ambush drakes that were holding a line, protecting the kobolds and cult acolytes. Duckie, ever resourceful, managed to sneak her way to the top of the wall and repelled down the outside of the keep wall, coming at the cult acolytes from behind. She managed to do so just as the group finished off the ambush drakes and with her help, the group made quick work of the remaining raiders.

After defeating the raiders that were defending the ready-room against exactly the kind of counter attack that the characters executed, the group barricaded the broken door with one of the weapon racks in the ready-room. After it was barricaded, Lou cast mending to repair the door. Duckie went back up to the wall and pulled her rope back up, keeping watch from the top of the wall. At that point, the characters asked the red-haired dwarf for his name, which he gave as Escobert the Red, before he went back into the courtyard to help the defenders.

After about half way through mending the door, a group of eight raiders approached the door from outside. Spotted by Thamior and Duckie, the rest of characters were warned of the approach. Moki and Duckie took to the wall to shoot down the approaching group while the remaining characters braced the door.

I played this combat a bit differently since the enemy wasn't able to fight back effectively. I had the players up on the wall roll d20s, killing a creature with a 15 or greater, wounding with a 10 or greater, and missing with a 10 or below. Meanwhile, I had the bracing players make an opposed skill challenge with the monsters pushing the door open. Skill challenges are really cool and I love using them when I can. I think it gives some cool suspense, as was achieved in this case when the monsters, led by two particularly large raiders almost breached the door. The players were able to hold them at bay though, with Gwen commanding one of the large raiders to flee, taking the two kobolds with him in terror.

After repairing the door, the characters headed back into the courtyard, where they were greeted by the return of the huge blue dragon flying over the keep, using its Frightful Presence to strike fear into the adventurers. All except Thamior were stricken with terror, but were able to regain their composure as it passed over the walls. Approaching the characters, Escobert introduced himself more formally as the castellan of the keep adding, "Come with me. Governor Nighthill would like to see you."

Leading the characters up to the top of the tower, the characters met a human male, who greeted the characters warmly and introduced himself as Tarbaw Nighthill. He proceeded to thank the characters for their help and after being asked why Greenest was being attacked by a dragon, he said:

"I'd give anything to know what we're up against, and why. For that, we need prisoners. A commander, even a low-ranking one, would be best, but any information would do." Taking the characters over to the edge of the tower, the Governor points out a female human in purple robes, ordering two groups in different directions, and then disappearing behind a burning barn with her own dozen guards. "That one seems dangerous. I wouldn't ask you to take on her capture, especially when we can get information from anyone. The guards have spotted a new threat. Raiders are trying to set fire to the town's mill. If it burns, we'll lose our stockpile of flour and we won't be able to grind more for months. I'm trying to assemble enough defenders from here in the keep to defend it through the rest of the night, but that will take some time. You'd do us a great service if you could get to the mill quickly and drive away the raiders before they can set it aflame. You'll need to defend it until our force arrives to take over, but it shouldn't be more than fifteen minutes behind you. It may be that you can capture some of these raiders while taking on this mission, if you don't mind helping us more than you already have."

Nighthill related to the group that there had been other raids of much smaller scale around the rest of the Greenfields. This is the first attack on this scale and the first with a dragon. Asking for a rest, before they rescued the mill, Nighthill reiterated the urgency of the situation at the mill and referred the characters to Nathaniel Lightbow, a priest of Amaunator, god of the Sun, who was tending to the wounded down at the ground floor of the keep. He was able to heal the party and call upon his god for the restorative powers to grant the players back any spell slots.

Asking about a secret tunnel out of the keep, Escobert lit up and told the party about "the old tunnel" running from the cellar to the stream. As far as the castellan could recall, the tunnel had never been used. Leading the group down to the cellar, Escobert took some time to relate some of Greenest's history to the party. The castellan told the characters of Dharva Scatterheart, the female halfling who founded Greenest and how she fancied herself the "Queen of the Greenfields."

Walking down the cramped tunnel, with Moki's light spell illuminating the way, the party quickly squashed two swarms of rats, one of which, while retreating, seemed to disappear into one of the walls. Upon closer inspection, they discovered that there was a secret door and also found that it was trapped. If left to swing open normally, the door would have depressed a button causing lighting to surge through the metal handle. However, the group disarmed the trap and proceeded inside the room, finding a chest containing several items of interest:

• Chainmail armor with spattering of jet black rings that glowed purple in the magical light. Gnomish in size.
• Amulet of amber color with an ancient rune prominently displayed on it.
• Green boots have a leaflike appearance. Gnomish in size.
• Grey-blue cloak, lined in gold with chain mail pauldrons.
• Decanter of Endless Water — Horn shaped vessel with brass tips and a bone cap. Currently empty. Sloshes as if it contained water. Lou was able to identify this from his experience in the War Wizards of Cormyr.
• Glass vial with the likeness of a faerie with a silver cap, filled with a light-colored powder.
• Glass jar, 3 inches in diameter, contains a thick mixture that smells faintly of aloe.
• Pearl that is large and perfectly round.
• Three Potions of Healing — Glimmering red liquid gave them away to the players that were experienced with these potions.
• Brass ring with a heart (like an actual heart) shaped head.
• Spell Scrolls — feather fall, grease, fog cloud
• "Blueheart", a gnomish sized rapier with a blue hilt acts as a +1 weapon.

And that's where we ended the session! Next time (today) we'll see what happen's next.