Rhu's Sun nite game - In Search of the Unknown B1

[Rhuvein]

heh I was thinking about our group being 'clothing optional.' I wonder if I could squeeze into goblin rags. I wonder if I want goblin rags to touch my skin ....

Got it! Now that is funny!

[Rhuvein]

This Sunday, I'm working late afternoon to early evening ~ 8 PM.

So we'll have a later start time of approximately 8:15.

See ya then!

Bump for Gringnr . . in case he wants to put in an extra hour at work!

[Gringnr]

heh I was thinking about our group being 'clothing optional.' I wonder if I could squeeze into goblin rags. I wonder if I want goblin rags to touch my skin ....

Got it! Now that is funny!

Joke's on you, I've been playing naked all along

[Rhuvein]

Game on. . . . server up in a few minutes!

[Rhuvein]

Session III - Out of the prison and into the fire!

The adventurers:

Gringnr as:

Sheldwyn Surefoot, a halfling fighter/rogue

Penny as:

Blue Wulf, a female half-orc barbarian

Aergraith as:

Saxbert, a human fighter

NPCs:

Laroo Spugnar, a gnome wizard

Lavinia T. Farlowe, a female halfling cleric

Horatio Bagmuffin, a halfling glimjack

The action:

After the close encounter with the gelatinous cube, the party rests and recovers drinking from their wine and water skins. Everyone realizes that Blue Wulf is lucky to be alive and then at the same time, also realize that her clothes and armor are burned and destroyed by the acid.

The party goes back to the goblin prison and retrieve an ax and shield while the monsters are still sleeping. She is still without clothes, but the party members are careful not to stare. The group moves down to the east west corridor where Sheldwyn discovers some pit traps covered by a high quality black cloth material when he nearly falls into said trap.

Blue Wulf takes the cloth material and borrows a dagger to cut a serape for herself and then the party continues down the east corridor avoiding more pit traps. At the end of the hall they search for any secret doors and indeed, Sheldwyn finds one but is unable to figure out how to open it. The other party members look for a pressure plate, release or trigger but find nothing.

At that moment, the party sees animal skeletons charging at them and closing quickly. They turn and begin to defend themselves with several adventurers taking damage. Lavinia invokes her deities and holds up her holy symbol and is able to turn the undead creatures.

The heroes then double back and find the entrance corridor and explore the dining room where they fight three orgrillons and defeat them. They explore the entertainment room and find the large valuable statue, but cannot find a way to loosen it from the floor. They move out and explore the kitchen finding nothing of value and continue north.

The group encounters centipedes and fight and kill them.

End session.

[Rhuvein]

Session II . . XP = 168 per PC!

[Rhuvein]

Game on . . just trying to get a good image of a tarrasque for tonight's session.

[Rhuvein]

Server will be up in a moment!

[Rhuvein]

Session IV - Exploring the dungeon . . north

The adventurers:

Aergraith as:

Saxbert, a human fighter

Gringnr as:

Sheldwyn Surefoot, a halfling fighter/rogue

Penny as:

Blue Wulf, a female half-orc barbarian

NPCs:

Laroo Spugnar, a gnome wizard

Lavinia T. Farlowe, a female halfling cleric

Horatio Bagmuffin, a halfling glimjack

The action:

After carving up the centipedes, the party continues north and are able to avoid a pendulum axe trap. They come to a junction and decide to go east through some back and forth hallways and find a long corridor that goes north. They cautiously walk that way until the corridor goes east.

They peak around the corner, but see nothing.

[In progress]

[Rhuvein]

Working tomorrow late afternoon until 8 PM ~ so later start . . about 8:15!

Many thanks, see ya then!

[Gringnr]

Working tomorrow late afternoon until 8 PM ~ so later start . . about 8:15!

Many thanks, see ya then!

[Rhuvein]

I got off work early, so if anyone is around - we can start in 10 minutes or so . . or later, or whenever anyone is available!

[Rhuvein]

MT server is up!

[Rhuvein]

Session V - Polly wants a cracker

The adventurers:

Penny as:

Blue Wulf, a female half-orc barbarian

Aergraith as:

Saxbert, a human fighter

Gringnr as:

Sheldwyn Surefoot, a halfling fighter/rogue


NPCs:

Lavinia T. Farlowe, a female halfling cleric

Laroo Spugnar, a gnome wizard

Horatio Bagmuffin, a halfling glimjack

The action:

[Rhuvein]

Working until 7 PM, so unless I get off work a little early - game start at 7:15!

See y'all then.

[Gringnr]

See you then

[Rhuvein]

Game on at 7 PM or so or whenever everyone is ready . . .

[Rhuvein]

Reviewing the half-orc enhanced sense of smell with regard to the specific dungeon encounter in tonight's game and my thoughts:

Bluewulf detected some faint feces smell by the door to the parrot room.

The parrot room is fully enclosed and when the party enters, that smell is powerful possibly masking any creature odors from beyond that room.

In the kobold room, a brazier is flaming low but giving off smoke also masking any scents or odors.

The door to the kobold room is shut further limiting the half-orcs ability and the kobolds are at the far end of the room except for the shaman who is in the middle of the room, so the creature scent would be extremely faint, if at all detectable.

So, all factors considered and put into prospective . . . Bluewulf could not detect the creatures ~ due to the last line of the ability in the PH:

"It should be further noted that false, powerful odors can easily mask other scents and completely spoil this ability."

Much of the scenario info would not have been available to the party or Bluewulf because of the closed door and the party not knowing what was in the room beyond and so some info could not be revealed by me.

But, I will say and admit that I may have missed some opportunities for explaining some of what I mentioned above . . as sometimes we are all talking at the same time. But if I did miss something please post and let me know.

And, feel free to comment here or we can take it up next session for discussion.

[Rhuvein]

Great session, even if we did have some gaming challenges ~ one mentioned above.

I will address Aergraith's question about the shaman's movement and ability to cast, soon (mebbe tonight, even)!

[Rhuvein]

Great session, even if we did have some gaming challenges ~ one mentioned above.

I will address Aergraith's question about the shaman's movement and ability to cast, soon (mebbe tonight, even)!

Hmm, PH says cast and no movement.

It must be a house rule of mine or a HR of some the games that we've played here with the guys.

I was allowing the NPCs to move(1/2) and cast.

I wish to allow this.

Still investigating my notes from CZ on this, where I think I allowed it (as a HR).

[Penny-Whistle]

It was fun. I really like playing a barbarian. She'd probably be all in for a bar fight but a room full of magic pools? That would definitely cause her to pause. It would take more than sparkly rocks to motivate her to explore that room.

Humans are kind of sight centric by nature. It is difficult to picture a world of smell. It would be really tricky for me personally to shift gears that way -- take my story telling from pictures to describing smells! Now that's a challenge.

(Thinking about it makes us love our dogs more though maybe. I always feel my heart get stabbed a little when I see people tugging on their dog's leads to keep them from smelling things on the corner. Like, that is their newspaper! Owners keep their pets isolated and locked up all day and then refuse to let them know even the smell of their dog neighbours and passing wildlife. sigh.)

I respect your prerogative to say no. It sounds like you really wanted us to be surprised and that is cool if it is important to the story. Just to be a brat, I would say that if there is a fire smouldering that any member of the party would have smelled the smoke and been able to infer the presence of humanoids. But again, I think you wanted the surprise and I can appreciate that.

[Rhuvein]

I would say that if there is a fire smouldering that any member of the party would have smelled the smoke and been able to infer the presence of humanoids.

I'm thinking that smoke from burning braziers is wafting throughout the dungeon from the many rooms that have humanoids, so the party might be used to the smell or not sure where it's coming from. Both the orc and goblin rooms has burning braziers going when the party entered. No one mentioned whether they were put out or not.

Per out discussion last night and Aergraith's msg to me about having a roll to better deal with enhanced smell, I see the gnome has enhanced hearing. He get a plus +3 on listen checks, so mebbe giving the barbarian some bonus would work better in the future.

By the way, if Bluewulf were to smell the kobolds - what would she and/or the rest of the party do differently?

[Penny-Whistle]

I have no problem whatsoever with CK/DM/GM fiat. If it is important that we are surprised and you don't want us to even try to save against it because the story needs that to happen then you will hear no complaints here.

The barbarian class starts with a +2 against foes attempting to surprise them so there is no need to change anything. That class ability was the rationale behind the group decision to put the barbarian at the front of the line and why she asked Sheldwyn to consider NOT being the first person through the door. He is the trap checker and can pick a lock but she excels at enemy awareness and what I think of as the 'I've got a bad feeling about this' intuition. If every character uses their particular advantage then party survival is improved.

I guess the difference is that if you know enemies are on the other side of a door you can plan ahead for the confrontation and do more than react defensively. Winning a surprise round gives us options. With a +2 we sure won't win them all but when we do we can get creative: maybe trick the enemies out of the room and use the door as a choke point, prepare a spell ahead of time, get the Glimjack to prepare some burning oil, get a buff from the cleric, make a missile attack on the brazier to set their room on fire or any number of potential actions limited only by our imagination and the situation. Mathematically, avoiding surprise gives players the possibility of an extra attack which may result in taking less overall damage. That conserves the cleric's spells and means we don't have to rest as often.

That said, I know you watch out for us and make sure confrontations don't result in TPKs. And I trust your sense of story. I've been bringing in the sniff tests and combat awareness to the game because that is what my character has to offer the party beyond soaking up damage.

[Rhuvein]

It must be a house rule of mine or a HR of some the games that we've played here with the guys.

I was allowing the NPCs to move(1/2) and cast.

I wish to allow this.

Still investigating my notes from CZ on this, where I think I allowed it (as a HR).

No, I don't. I must have been out of my mind when I had the shaman cast and then move.

He would have closed the door in the next round, so I don't think it mattered for the combat.

[Rhuvein]

Good post, Penny!

Yes, your character should have had a chance to roll against a surprise . . my bad. I haven't had a barbarian in my game in a long time and was not really remembering their abilities.

And I/we need to have the gnome use his listen checks regularly.

[Penny-Whistle]

I think this needs saying: I really really appreciate your games you know. =)
I don't know if my character should have had a roll in that particular case. I truly believe those things are totally your call. AND I know from experience I can trust that your encounters will be balanced regardless of a surprise roll or not.

Dear Diary,

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a half-orc in the company of humans must be in want of her senses. Tonight I ask myself yet again why I continue to torture myself with this fool's errand of trying to comprehend the ways of my father's people. Do they or do they not have souls? This is a mystery that may never find solution.

This evening we came upon a room filled with unnatural pools of liquid. Did we simply leave a note to inform others of the danger and then close the door? Did we thank our gods for giving us the sense to avoid disaster? No. Upon sight of the sparkling rocks and beaten metal disks, The Shifty Eyed One's will was wholly consumed. I hardly dare commit his indiscretion to paper but in a week's time I am likely to disbelieve what I saw otherwise. This fully grown person applied several of the unknown liquids to his tongue! Even the smallest orc whelp respects the danger of poison. The 'waters' left his wits addled and his manner euphoric. Happily that was all. My imagination pictured consequences far worse. I thanked the Raven Goddess silently on his behalf. He invited the rest of the group to join him but I politely declined.

On the subject of human culture I remain fascinated but hopelessly blutterbunged. I can only wonder what wonders I will behold next.

Love,
Blue Wulf

[Rhuvein]

I think this needs saying: I really really appreciate your games you know. =)
I don't know if my character should have had a roll in that particular case. I truly believe those things are totally your call. AND I know from experience I can trust that your encounters will be balanced regardless of a surprise roll or not.

Thanks, Penny!

[Rhuvein]

Dear Diary,

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a half-orc in the company of humans must be in want of her senses. Tonight I ask myself yet again why I continue to torture myself with this fool's errand of trying to comprehend the ways of my father's people. Do they or do they not have souls? This is a mystery that may never find solution.

This evening we came upon a room filled with unnatural pools of liquid. Did we simply leave a note to inform others of the danger and then close the door? Did we thank our gods for giving us the sense to avoid disaster? No. Upon sight of the sparkling rocks and beaten metal disks, The Shifty Eyed One's will was wholly consumed. I hardly dare commit his indiscretion to paper but in a week's time I am likely to disbelieve what I saw otherwise. This fully grown person applied several of the unknown liquids to his tongue! Even the smallest orc whelp respects the danger of poison. The 'waters' left his wits addled and his manner euphoric. Happily that was all. My imagination pictured consequences far worse. I thanked the Raven Goddess silently on his behalf. He invited the rest of the group to join him but I politely declined.

On the subject of human culture I remain fascinated but hopelessly blutterbunged. I can only wonder what wonders I will behold next.

Love,
Blue Wulf

Hmmm, I believe this refers to Sheldwyn, no? If so, you may have forgotten that he is a halfling!

[Penny-Whistle]

How insensitive of me! I DO apologize. Was it his mother or father that was the Ling?

[Rhuvein]

How insensitive of me! I DO apologize. Was it his mother or father that was the Ling?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halfling

[Aside . . reminds me that I need to re-read the Sword of Shannara series by Terry Brooks!]