Rainy weather, not quite cold but not quite warm
March 31st, 2019
Characters:
Valus Spicemaster, Human Wizard (250 points)
Artemis, Elf Scout (250 points)
Athena, Human Wizard (250 points)
Matthieu the Corsair, Human Swashbuckler (250 points)
Alucard, Human Holy Warrior (250 points)
Father Delaney, Human Cleric (250 points)
Joey the Quick, Human Knight (250 points)
Father Seamus, Human Initiate (?? points)
Marcus Octavius Lupus, Human Knight (?? points)
The group met one another whilst traveling with a trading caravan that was going on to Jotenthund, a city in a northern country in Myrdas. At some point on the road there (most of), the group spotted a heavyset priest running as fast as he could out of the woods yelling “Help me! Help me!” to the group. Everyone made their Perception rolls and noticed, with the exception of Joey the Quick who was too busy looking over at the trees. Valus sprang into action and made himself a quick Ice Dagger to throw at the incoming orcs before yelling “Joey! Bad guys!”. Artemis fast-drew an arrow and took a shot at the orc bowman because “I’m the only one who’s allowed to have a bow.” Suddenly, I’m having flashbacks of Alaric from Dungeon Fantastic. Despite Artemis making a tough shot at a pretty far range, the orc archer managed to dodge the arrow no problem. Matthieu, Alucard, and Father Delaney all moved up their move speed. Joey the Quick was able to make his Perception roll this time and turned to follow his companions. The orcs ran and the archer took a wild shot at Artemis that just whizzed by. Valus decided to throw his Ice Dagger despite the range and just barely missed. Artemis fast-drew another arrow and took another shot at one of the oncoming orcs who also manage to make a spectacular dodge, (these orcs rolled better than any PC I’ve ever played). Matthieu continued to run up before getting pretty close to the closest orc. Alucard moved up and Father Delaney debated giving someone a flaming weapon before realizing his only option was Joey who still wasn’t close to combat so he just moved up instead, as did Joey. The orc archer took another shot at Artemis (I think?) before his buddy managed to reach Matthieu. The orc took a wild swing at Matthieu with his great axe which Matthieu parried with ease. The orcs who made the spectacular dodge changed course after the great axe orc ushered a command in orcish and bolted towards Artemis. The orc archer missed another shot and the female orc continued to advance. Valus decided to come up with a creative solution to see if he could get an upper hand on the orcs by creating a Simple Illusion of a “lusty nude orc maid” in an attempt to distract them. I thought this was pretty clever and would give each of the orcs a Perception roll and then a subsequent 1d roll to determine whether they were distracted by the naked orc and was interrupted or was enraged that “the humans took one of their women hostage!” The two orcs that noticed were 50/50 on the reaction. Artemis decided to see if she could take advantage of this newly dazed orc by shooting an arrow at his face. I decided to give a Perception roll just to see if he could try to dodge and he crit before he proceeded to perform another excellent dodge. Matthieu decided to swing his at the great axe orc’s neck for a decent amount of damage. Despite this cut, the orc stayed up, bleeding. Alucard, Father Delaney, and Joey the Quick all moved closer into range. The orc archer decided he wanted to send an arrow over to the thick of the battle where his buddy just took a cut to the neck but missed and managed to hit the female orc in the back. The Acrobatic orc decided to continue his rush at Artemis who had been trying to hit him with arrows for the past few rounds. Valus decided he didn’t want Artemis to get hurt so he moved his Illusion into the hex in front of Artemis and made her do a “sexy hip shake” as an attempt to distract the orc. A critical Perception roll said that he absolutely did and in his daze Artemis decided to shoot an arrow directly into his eye, killing him instantly. It was at this point that Matthieu’s player had to leave for work and a backup tabletop vet took over. The new player decided “well Matthieu did pretty well with that neck swing so let’s try that again.” This time though Matthieu did nearly maximum damage which just happened to be enough to decapitate him. Alucard and Father Delaney moved up while Joey advanced upon the female orc before taking a wild swing and missed. The orcs decided to take a shot a couple of unsuccessful attacks before Valus started advancing his lusty orc towards them. Atermis pumped an arrow into the archer who took a bit of damage and Matthieu used rapid-strike to thrust to the vitals of the female orc who died almost instantly. Alucard yelled to the remaining orc archer in an attempt to intimidate him. This chain of events led to the orc fleeing for his life. After Father Delaney decided to pat down the priest of whom he was very distrustful, Valus and Alucard learned that Father Seamus was a disgraced drunken priest who’d been kicked out of the cloister for his alcoholism and he was trying to atone by going to Tyrvali Barrow to eliminate some of the evil he had heard about lurking there.
They found Athena sleeping in a cart (her player arrived somewhat late) and asked if she wanted to come along. The group decided to help him out and help root out any evil they find (and maybe find some treasure).
Everyone wandered around the caravan and asked about this Tyrvali Barrow and if anyone knew anything about it. Rumors were heard and questions were asked before they came upon Tyrvali Barrow. The Barrow itself appears almost as a huge burial mound from far away but upon closer inspection, it is made of large stones and bricks that the grass has grown over over the centuries. Standing outside the two large double doors that can be seen when approaching from the south was a very large man in shiny Lorica Segmentata armor with a red cape and red lophos on his helmet with a large spiked maul. He stared inquisitively at the door before Matthieu approached and asked who he was. He revealed himself to be Marcus Octavius Lupus, a man who resides in Jotenthund who has recently gone a bit broke and figured he could find a little money in the Barrow. After some hesitation, the group decided to accept his help and he pushed open the doors with ease.
When the group entered the Barrow they had to create some lightstones since it was dark inside and they began exploring straight ahead. They discovered a door that was mostly broken down ahead of them that seemed to enter a room filled with spiderwebs. They had Marcus open the door and they all poured in before Matthieu and Artemis noticed some movement in the far corner or the room which they all turned and saw to be two huge spiders. The spiders immediately ran up to Marcus and Joey and tried to bite them. Joey blocked the bit with his shield but a bite got through Marcus’s defenses but it wasn’t enough to get through his metal armor. Valus tried to whack the spiders with his staff but he missed poorly and managed to hit Marcus instead who had no chance to defend despite all out defending. Artemis stepped to the side for better line of sight before sending an arrow into the head of the spider after a debate about spider vitals vs. skulls and how to call that with this being an exoskeleton. Athena quickly put together a 3d Stone missile and Alucard stepped up to Joey’s flank getting ready to strike the next round. Father Delaney elected to wait as there wasn’t much he could do from the back. Joey took a swing at the spider in front of him and sliced it pretty well, wounding it severely. The spiders made some attempted to attack Marcus and Joey who both defended well. Artemis drew another arrow and sunk it into the spider she had hit before, killing it. Athena then tossed her stone missile over Marcus’s should and squashed the wounded spider into a paste after rolling high on her damage, thus ending the fight. After searching the room they found bits of animal that had been torn to shreds and a desiccated orc corpse who had a poor quality sword among his body. Artemis was also able to carefully remove a spider egg sac from the spiderwebs choking this room.
They decided afterward that’s they wanted to explore the hallway heading west. The group had Marcus open a door on the left which led to a small room containing broken bits of terra cotta pots which they were able to identify as burial urns. They found a bit of silver scattered among the pieces. They then continued on to an intersection that had a rubble-choked hallway going forward and a hall to the right. Continuing on they found a door around the corner that looked to be bowed out as if it was being pushed opposite the way it is supposed to open. The group asked Marcus to open it and told them it felt like he was pressing against the wall. They debated burning it down to try to get behind it but ultimately decided it would be dangerous to wait around for the door to burn down and they advanced up the hallway. Some of the group spotted a rune (pictured below). Alucard immediately noticed something off about this. He executed a thorough search of the area and found a loose stone that, when pushed in, created an audible click and seam opened up in the stone. A secret door! He and Valus ventured inside to find a bust of an old man wearing an eyepatch and a necklace around the bust’s neck. Valus was able to recognize this as a necklace of fireballs which they gave to Father Delaney to keep him safe.
The hallway ahead opened up to a room ahead and a long hallway to the right. The group elected to advance ahead into an empty square room that open to the right and ahead. It felt almost like a waiting area to the room whose entrance was in the top right of this room.
Advancing in the group could tell this room was big. It they were immediately met by large stone columns and they approached the room with caution. After determining it appeared safe they began to explore and look around. The room was almost like a trapezoid with a curved top when was sunken in by stairs and flooded with murky brown water. In the center of the room past the 5 columns was an altar with various woodland animals carved on its sides. The top of the alter sloped towards a channel that went down the middle of the stairs to the altar. They decided that this must be some kind of sacrifice and Father Seamus said he had heard of this ancient religion practicing sacrifices. This brought about a variety of trials. Valus dropped a drip of his blood into the water which did nothing. He tried dripping it into the altar where it fizzled and dried like water in a hot pan but nothing happened. They then debated about the spider eggs but then remembered the spider corpses so they decided to send Matthieu, Artemis, and Athena to go get it. Upon reaching the main hallway they care into contact with a living skeleton who managed to advance quickly enough on them to take a swing at Matthieu, who parried with ease. Artemis sunk an arrow into its chest and seemed unaffected by it. Athena created a 5d stone missile to throw at the skeleton and Matthieu took a swing at the skeleton for a random location, the arm. The skeleton attempted to parry but critically failed and dropped its sword before Matthieu’s longsword removed the bony arm from its socket. The skeleton then attempted to shield bash Matthieu who dodged. Artemis dunk an arrow into the skull which didn’t seem to do much. Athena the threw her 5d stone missile, which the skeleton failed to dodge before it was shattered into a million pieces. The three returned to the group with spider corpse in tow and placed it on the altar for Marcus to crush. As spider good made its way down the channel into the murky water...nothing seemed to happen. Disappointed, Alucard sId he wanted to look behind the door in the top right corner of the room. Marcus and Father Delaney accompanied him and in it they found catacombs. At the end of the catacombs, Alucard noticed a symbol on the wall (pictured below which he began to study) thanks to a series of bad perception rolls and helmets the three failed to realize the 4 skeletons who’d risen from their cubbies until a bony claw swiped at Father Delaney. It was at this point that the player who subbed in for Matthieu pointed out the time and that many of us had work and school the next day and we decided to finish up next session.
Today was the first day that I got to run a DFRPG Campaign and the first time I DM’d with my own content that I had written. These two things made for an interesting session over a few hours that ended up being a lot of fun. I’m looking to see how this group will progress and keep playing (a few players are college students who return home for the summer and at least one player is moving to Europe). The introductory “Learn to Play” combat scenario took a lot longer than I thought. We only have one or two experienced tabletop RPG players and no one had played DF before so this, coupled with the fact that the orcs and a lot of the group’s fighters have a low move speed resulted in a lot of “I move up 3-4 spaces” “the orcs move up 4 spaces and take a shot with their bow” which could have been done better but you live and you learn. I think this is going to be a really fun group and I’ve got some fun monsters and puzzles waiting for them. I’m excited for the sessions to come!
