Thursday, December 27, 2018

Tarrasque one-shot (session 24, my count was off)


The party had rested, recuperated their spells and abilities, and somehow were 20th level. Jewell had eschewed the warlock training and took on a few barbarian levels, Yucatrill trained up some rogue skills, Ace the forge cleric/wizard/fighter made his appearance, Kadence became very strong in the down time, Stone became terrifying, and Drixel found a bit of faith worked into  paladin/rogue/barbarian. The group was celebrating their previous adventures at a festival in their honor and watched as the great stone pillars started shaking. The ground quaked and horrible form ripped itself from the soil, rending apart the stone pillars… the dreaded Tarrasque entered Godmoot. 

Over fifty-foot-tall and almost a hundred feet long, the tarrasque loomed dangerously over the party. The group quickly leapt into action, Drixel charging ahead and chucking a javelin at the beast. The party sought to trap the beast and keep it away from their ranged fighters, three of the party had taken the sentinel feat, causing chaos with the large monster tactics. The beast lashed out with its bite, grabbing Drixel between its teeth, followed by more slashes against the front line and lobbing tail spines at the ranged foes. The group also noticed strange magical energies moving across the battle field but were not sure what to make of it at first. The Tarrasque waited till the group had piled up near each other and inhaled deeply, and blasted super charged electricity out in a ten-foot line from itself, catching three characters. Jewell used her eldritch blast and watched as the rays bounced off its shell and flew off into the distance. She switched out her wand for a greataxe and charged the beast. The war mage Stone spent the first two rounds drinking potions and casting Bigby’s hand. He became as strong as a giant and one size bigger as well. Drixel found himself swallowed by the beast and ended up in the stomach, it was terrible. He was able to fight back against the crushing and the acid to carve into the meat of the wall and got regurgitated, leading me to act out a hairball situation in the store. Drixel for the moment was almost safe, or at least not inside a monster. 

Once the party started focusing damage on the tarrasque Yucatrill felt himself suddenly far away, surrounded by nothing as far as he could see, just faint outlines across the horizon. There had been a flash of green a few of the party noticed, and the next round Yucatrill came back, having solved his extra-dimensional maze he had ended up in. The next round the party was hit by a chain lightning spell from an unseen source. Getting sick of the spells Yucatrill cast see invisibility and could see a very angry and familiar lich in hand me down robes launching spells at the party, Mordel had come to slay. The Tarrasque let out more blasts of dark lightning and things were starting to look rough for most of the party, the barbarians getting pummeled by magical energy they could not resist, but also giving back more damage than they were taking. Ace, Drixel, and Kadence all gained bonus attacks if the tarrasque attacked anyone other then them, making themselves targets. Ace also gave any creature attacking him disadvantage on the attacks, leading the tarrasque to think both he and Stone were somehow illusions because it could not hit them. Ace was able to heal up the party a bit with a mass healing word, only missing Drixel, who had ended up inside the tarrasque again, and Yucatrill, who was on the other side of the map. Mordel moved in close to the wounded Ace, still invisible to most of the group, and whispered a terrible word into Ace's ear. Ace died on the spot. Power word kill is brutal.

Kiva joined the brawl at this point. Drixel was hoping to find a way out of the tarrasque again but fell victim to the horrible acid that is within the tarrasque with no hope of rescue. Bearfist joined the fray! Kadence was getting two attacks a round, Jewell had been hasted early on and had four attacks a round with her frenzied rage, Stone had put up a ninth level Bibgy’s hand dealing constant punching damage, Yucatrill had done massive damage with his gun, Drixel was able to score some great hits with his divine smites and grant everyone advantage on attacks against the Tarrasque, Bearfist flurried with all his shadow monk power and trying to stun the beast, before his death Ace was able to get off a few cones of cold against the beast, and the tarrasque looked mostly unfazed. At a point it grew very sleepy, not finding an easy meal and it decided to climb back down the hole it had come out of. The party was shocked, the monster just up and got bored with them. As it was retreating Stone hit it with flesh to stone spell, making it a permanent resident of Godmoot, or at least the tip of its tail coming out of the hole in the ground. 

During the routing of the Tarrasque, Yucatrill had become a bit distracted, Mordel did not like being shot by Yucatrill so he tried to disintegrate the artificer, just barely missing him. Yucatrill summoned a cube of force and protected himself from damn near everything. At this point Mordel’s only ally was a garden statue and became target number one for the party. His globe of invulnerability made him all but immune to most spells, having cast it at 9th level, but did not protect him from ridiculously buff skull crushers curb stomping his face. As his power faded, he imploded, knocking Kadence unconscious. The party picked themselves out of the rubble and claimed their victory.

This campaign was fun to run but did get complicated by massive turnouts for players at the game store. We started strong with ten or eleven players, with five players being the least and fourteen players being the most showing up for a session. It made doing any sort of role playing difficult and caused me to run more of a combat-based game. There were technically twenty-four sessions of this campaign. We started with a sea voyage and pirate fighting, fought against odd flesh warped creatures, investigated a forgotten city full of frog people, negotiated with giants, killed other giants, fought a massive dragon, and brushed the tip of what was originally planned for this game. At some point I plan to put out a campaign guide for other Dungeon Masters to run adventures in this land and a few others I have worked on. 

I would like to take this chance to thank the many players we had at the game store. Some nights were tough with effectively a small military strike force or three adventuring parties worth of characters at one table. you were all troopers and deserve a pat on the back. 

I am looking forward to the next adventure, Out of the Abyss. I will continue the writeups as much as possible, meaning there might be some spoilers to the plot of the adventure, but I will be mixing more of the older Underdark adventures and some homebrew elements into it as well. 

Thank you for reading the writeups! 

Friday, December 21, 2018

Untamed Wilds session 22



Our party made it to the dig site safely. Along with their angel friend and Keyhaw, the group of Mai, Striker, Stone, Red, Astra, Japachi, Chance, Kadence, Kiva, Carrososa, Drixel, Keeper, and Weirdo the second entered a large chamber of dirt and musty air. Across the way they could see a hulking giant, a multiheaded lich like creature, and seven cultists chanting around pit in the ground. Astra left her found elf skin book out in the hallway. As soon as the party started precasting spells the monsters knew they were there. Mordel the lich laughed at them for daring interrupt his ritual. The giant rushed toward the party, engaging both Stone and Kadence and taking huge swings at them. Mai helped Rex Kadence again and Carrososa made her bite attacks holy with a spell. Half the party attempted to spread out to the north, the others to the south hoping to disrupt whatever was happening and the pit as well as hit the lich and the giant. Keyhaw went around invisibly surveying the battlefield, trying to find a place to be the most useful and the angel went and started attacking the ritual casters. Mordel seemed resilient, each time the party cast a spell while within close range of him they would start a dispelling battle, each of his heads reacting and attempting to punch through the magical energy to either help or hinder the magic. He was able to dismiss the polymorph effect on Kadence rather early in the fight. His lair also sprouted eyes and skeletons, allowing him to attack with swarms of allies and see characters where normal vision should have failed. Striker and Red got in a few well-placed shots on Mordel, even forcing him to evoke a shield spell. Stone got in a good magical giant hand attack, grabbing Mordel and slamming him into the ceiling. Mordel shouted to his minions to finish the ritual quicker. The giant became engulfed in wolves as the two young druids summoned their swarm. Astra engulfed four of the cultists in a wall of fire and a few other party members took a few shots at them. The party watched as the seven cultists, many of which were still on fire dove into the pit, falling a great distance before a few low thunks could be heard. The ground shook and buckled a bit as two colossal claws rose from the darkness and through the wall of fire. 

A long-rotted neck of black and red scales topped with just the skull of an ancient dragon rose above the flames, flicking the remains of the dust from its boney wings. The party screamed as a colossal magma dragon skeleton entered the fray. Mordel dispelled the magic of the floating hand that held him and hid behind his dragon, administering some much needed healing to himself. 











While in shock of the dragon, over half of the party was caught in its flame breath, many falling close to single digits and Keeper getting knocked unconscious. Scrambling, Carrososa was able to get most the party back up, having cast beacon of hope before the blast and having mass healing word at his disposal. The giant, having been a fire giant was unharmed and started tearing into the seared party, scoring some strong hits on Kadence. Drixel took this chance to “parkour” off the dragon and tackle grapple Mordel. In this attempt he was successful, had he failed he would have fallen into the pit. He disrupted a few of Mordel’s spells and got stabbed by an artifact sword for his trouble. Kiva took this chance to get in a few good stabs on Mordel as well. Mordel did not like this, cast cloudkill on himself, being immune to its effects, and on his next turn snuck out of the clutches of Drixel via magic, Drixel falling towards the pit but getting caught by a now visible Keyhaw, who had been trying to find a way to sever an effect on Mordel but kept failing. 

The group noticed that magical tendrils of magic were feeding into Mordel and his shadowy extra skulls were taking the brunt of the damage for him. Mai did his best to keep Kadence a dinosaur but either damage or magic kept knocking her out of the form. Arrows and bullets raked his form, Mordel did not like this, but like a mosquito, this small bird with a blade kept sneaking in and bleeding out his energy. Mordel struck Kiva with a finger of death spell and two large shadow sword strikes, sending the little bird running. 

  
The giant eventually fell to the mighty combined effort of the party and the group was hit with another fire blast from the dragon. The angel ally had perched on the skull of the beast and struck blow upon blow across its brow but the dragon ignored it, the beast seemed intent on eating the Kadence Rex and Stone in front of it. The party rained blow after blow against this dragon, seeing minor signs of wear and tear forming arounds its edges. Keeper turned into an air elemental and started chasing Mordel, eventually catching up with him and chucking him and Kiva with a whirlwind attack, almost causing Mordel to fall into the pit with Kiva. Kiva, could and can fly so danger was not as sudden as everyone expected. Blast after blast and many lightning bolts rocked the titan sized dragon and eventually one last gunshot to the skull caused it to back up and fall into the pit, catching Kiva and bringing her to the ground. The rest of the group ganged up on Mordel, Kadence charging and grappling him and he slapped her arms away. She tried again and got him and dove off into the pit, taking him with her, as well as Stone for the ride, falling close to three hundred feet. The bottom of the pit was becoming crowded with Kiva, Stone, Kadence, a dead dragon, a slew of dead cultists, and Mordel, but they were joined by Drixel and Mai via dimension door. Mordel wanted to take as many of them with himself and disincorporated himself into an explosion, which Stone canceled with a counterspell. Mordel still dissolved, leaving his gear. Stone grabbed the cloak and started cackling and the rest of the party made their way out of the pit, having had enough of this place. Astra went to grab the skin book but found it was missing. The party rejoiced in their seeming victory and returned to town. After tales of their victory spread the town scheduled a party in their honor. 

Our next adventure begins mid festival with the ground cracking near the party and a massive form burrowing out of the ground… the dreaded tarrasque one shot is next.

Some photos came from Jarrod, one of my players. Thank you for taking pictures, all of mine were from my side of the table, and mostly the back side of a dragon. 

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Untamed Wilds Session 21!


Deep within the lair of Mordel the party of many made their way through fifty-foot-tall and wide hallways, sized possibly for titans, to their first goal, the library. Astra the changeling wizard of invention, Drixel the barbarian rogue, Carrososa the turtle life cleric, Japachi the lizard folk druid, Chance the cat folk ranger, Jewell the cat folk warlock, Yucatrill the artificer harpy, Kadence the centaur barbarian, Striker the Kenku sniper, Stone the warmage warforged, and Mai the satyr bard crept through the pyramid. Striker was able to lead the group through most of the pyramid easily, having been until very recently trapped within its cold confines. The party noted what appeared to be wing marks on the walls and eventually found themselves at a rusted iron door. Drixel greased the hinge and the party was able to crack the door a bit, getting hit by a humid breeze from within. The once great library had been waterlogged, once great tomes made way for fungal growth. The walls and shelves were hidden by fungus and both large and small mushrooms. Within they found a strange mushroom man with a watering can dampening the mushrooms in the area. 

Mai approached him after calling out and getting no response and felt a shortness of breath and could see strange motes of energy floating around the camber. The rest of the party watched as Mai stood still and locked eyes with the creature, not knowing that Mai had just told the thing that they were there to kill Mordel, the spore telepathy made no sound of course. They watched in horror as two thirty-foot-tall mushroom creatures came out of the shelves and the strange little mushroom man started banging around his watering can, which clanged loudly with an alarm. Battle began with Striker landing three arrows critically into the mushroom man and the rest of the party rushing in and fighting the other two larger ones. Mai silenced the mushroom man’s watering can. Numerous party members hung out in the hall and started to detect far off boot steps and entered the library, throwing magical spells and arrows at the stomping giant mushrooms and their smaller friend. Red was able to fire off a few shots, the echoes of the blast traveled much further into the complex, Jewell was able to hit with her eldritch blasts, moving the creatures around the field. Carrososa used his spirit guardians to tear apart the mushrooms as well. Japachi was able to use her flame blade to cut into the mushrooms and Chance landed a few arrows into the monsters. As the flames were stopping the mushrooms from growing bigger, Astra investigated the one book shelf that seemed to have nothing growing on top of it. She found a strange little preserved study with a tome bound in what seemed to be pale elf flesh. The Tome of Mordel gave the party insight into the life of this strange undead wizard and his three brothers. The group eventually killed off the three mushrooms and burning the remains trying to keep the mushrooms from growing back, there seemed to be some kind of magical energy watering this room as well as growing more guardians. The group closed the library door and hid within a tiny hut of magical energy, Astra changing her shape to look like the mushroom man and grabbing his watering can. 

A greeting was shouted from outside the door, then a knocking, and eventually the door was opened by a familiar looking satyr storyteller. Keyhaw and two animated scarecrows wearing large oversized boots with loose bones tied to their bodies entered the room and addressed the mage turned mushroom man by making eye contact and straining his face. When he realized that the mushroom man could not hear him, he addressed the mage vocally, stating he was here as a friend. The party realized he was there and a few members came out of the hut to greet him. They all rested and recovered from the battle and were able to regain their health and spells. After their rest they caught up with Keyhaw and noticed there was a massive mushroom growing in the back forgotten corner, larger than any the group had seen before. After debating the merits of popping it they decided to leave and never come back to this chamber. 

They made their way carefully to the prison area and saw the room was guarded by four horned devils and within one of the cages they could make out a passed-out form of a large white skinned and winged creature. The party waited outside the chamber while Mai cast the tiny hut spell. As the spell was finished Kadence was polymorphed into a t-rex and charged the horned devils, taking them by surprise. Drixel charged in as well attempting to make his way to the caged figure and stabbing the devils on the way, he took a few hits and was viciously bleeding. The rest of the group sat safely in the hut, stepping out to attack and disappearing back into the enclosure. Japachi sent out a moon beam as well, causing the devils an almost constant damage. The devils hit hard and the party watched as Kadence rex was losing more blood than was reasonable from the hits she was taking. Keyhaw ran out and healed both Kadence and Drixel, ending their bleeding. The group focused down, wiping out the devils before anyone else could get magically cursed wounds. After the combat they found the angel creature in the cage. They attempted to open it and set off the trap, taking minor fire damage. The angel was alive but unconscious and they pumped some healing and good berries into it. The angel thanked them and summoned a blade from nothing, seeking vengeance against Mordel for the torture they had endured while stuck in this prison. The party was split between stealing the rest of the angel bones in the other cages or leaving them, so Carrososa blessed the ground and laid them to rest. 

The angel, Keyhaw, and the group made their way to the barracks. Keyhaw gave everyone some candy that restored their health and spells as they snuck across the pyramid. They found wide open doors leading to a massive chamber with large shelves on the walls stacked with bones and the dead. In the center of the room were several battalions of skeletons wearing ancient armor. The few of the party decided after seeing around a thousand skeletons in the chamber, sending up a fire wall and expecting the skeletons to run into it. They heard orders barked out in an ancient dialect and moments later a hail of arced arrows rained down on the party, wounding all except Kiva, the swashbuckler that finally had caught up to them. The party took out around ten of the skeletons and decided to run away, hearing more of the ancient words and more arrows came down around them. They exited the chamber from the door they entered and Mai used another tiny hut spell to secure the door, using an ancient fey trick of leaving blood and a miniature version of the caster within the structure and the group ran off to the deep dig site, leaving what they hoped was the final chamber, the throne room for last.

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Wednesday, December 5, 2018

Untamed Wilds Session 20!!


In the morning the party found themselves at the entrance of the ruined city at the base of a mountain with a stranger in front of them. The party consisted of Astra the changeling wizard of invention, Drixel the barbarian rogue, Carrososa the turtle life cleric, Japachi the lizark folk druid, Chance the cat folk ranger, Kadence the centaur barbarian, Stone the warmage warforged, Keeper the Aasimir druid, Braa formerly known as Awesome Bro the harpy rogue, Kiva harpy swashbuckler, and Mai the satyr bard. The group did their usual preliminary questions to make sure Astra was not evil or out to kill them. 

Meanwhile inside the giant adamantine pyramid Striker the raven folk ranger noticed light for the first time in a while, his unknowing jailer gave away plot details revealing mega plots. Striker took this moment to escape from the pyramid and make his way across the city proper. The rest of the group with new friend Astra could hear and see strange large sized figures patrolling inside the city, the new stealth crew flew up to investigate while Astra walked over to see if they were friendly. She quickly found out that the grave elementals were indeed not friendly but evil skull filled dirt monsters. 

The party took quick action as six of these creatures charged the front line at the gates. Astra started the fray with a quick fire bolt and hiding around the corner, Drixel moved up closer to the pack, trying to divert the monsters from hitting squishy opponents, Carrososa used guiding bolt to highlight one of the elementals, Japachi used her calling card spell MOON BEAM, Chance tore into the guided monster with two arrows, and then the elemental swarm moved, throwing wild punches in the parties direction as well as a few ranged skull attacks as well. Kadence swung in, charging one of the leading elementals, Stone used fire bolt, Keeper cast fairy fire (the play of the game) granting all of his allies advantage on all attacks against the elementals, Braa used his short bow to greatly hamper one of the elementals with a well placed shot, Kiva ran up to one of the elementals and held her attack, and Mia turned Kiva into a dinosaur again, triggering Kiva’s attack on the elementals. The first round was tricky but quicker than normal. 

The melee devolved into area of effect spells and spiritual guardians sealing the fates of elementals that tried to pursue foes on the map as well as stationary problems. Astra misty stepped away from the melee to try and light up a wall of fire but went with a fire bolt instead. The elementals got in a few good hits on the party while getting battered with multiple barbarians, dinosaur attacks, and divine energy thwapping upside their skulls. There was a moment where Stone was casting haste and a deathlock came out of hiding to attempt to counter spell it but failed so very badly, the spell went off and the dinosaur was much faster. The undead fled with magic. After a few round the elementals were broken and Striker, the wayward ranger ambled back up to the group. He animatedly pantomimed to Mai that there is a three headed skull man with a dragon. The party was unphased and prepared themselves to raid the pyramid, they first had to cross the rest of the city but at least they knew what they might be facing. 

They healed up a bit while they walked. At the giant crack in the mountain the group saw two more of the deathlocks in the opening on guard duty. They looked bored out in the sunlight. Astra used wall of fire and started roasting the undead, which took their turn to get out of the flames. The party descended on the deathlocks like starving hounds. The undead were able to dismiss the magical dinosaur in the room and restrain her with unholy energy and get off a few other blasts of blight and eldritch blast but eventually were both picked up and held in the wall of fire by the barbarians. Screams of pain echoed across the dead city and through the flames, bouncing off of beautiful black marble floors and walls of the adamantine pyramid. Victorious, the party gathered up and made ready to enter the tomb of Mordel. 

With two sessions left, what awaits our heroes?

Sunday, December 2, 2018

Untamed Wilds session 19

The party of Jewell the cat folk warlock, Yucatrill the artificer harpy, Stone the warforged war wizard, Kadence the centaur barbarian, Limbsmasher the goliath wizard, Kiva the harpy swashbuckler, Keeper the Druid, Awesome Bro the other harpy rogue, Mai the satyr bard, Drixel the cat folk barbarian rogue, the gnome druid, and Kroska the turtle person life cleric set about making camp for the night. Kadence and the familiar Tiny took first watch when Kadence noticed movement and the sounds of digging coming from near their camp. She came across a black scaled dragon, emaciated and undead digging among the dead trees. She backed away and her hooves scuffed a rock, causing the undead dragon to notice the group.

Combat was initiated and the party was quick to move against the dragon, throwing spells and attacks its way. The beast called out, howling to unseen allies and followed with a blast of acid breath, hitting a few of the party members. Then the gnome cast call lightning and blasted the dragon often, Jewell used her eldritch blasts to move the dragon around the battlefield, Yucatrill got off a few good shots from his thunder cannon, Kroska was able to bring a few of his allies back from terrible wounds, Limbsmasher dropped some walls of fire and fireballs on the dragon, Keeper attempted to faire fire the dragon but it leapt out of the way, Awesome Bro shot a few arrows from a relatively safe distance, Kadence got up real close to the dragon, Kiva got closer to the dragon holding her attack, Stone hasted Kiva, Mai cast polymorph on Kiva turning her into a tyrannosaurus and used his inspiration to send Kiva to the dragon flailing with multiple attacks, and Drixel ran up and stabbed at the dragon.

The dragon, having taken some grievous blows fought back, eventually took wing and knocked a few of the party prone and flew off. A second dragon appeared with a rider, a deathlock. The two of them laid into the party with breath attacks and attempted spells, Stone using counterspell to great effect. The first dragon eventually fell to the combined attacks of the party and the rider of the second dragon was forced to laugh at a bad joke. The dragon recognized its master was unhinged and fled from its attackers. Around this time the party heard odd splashes from the distance and a large breaking of dead trees. A long dead kraken was pulling its way out of the water by using the trees. It got near the party and unleashed a long line of lightning, catching a few unaware. Kiva attempted to run from the kraken but was grabbed by its tentacle and slammed on the ground.

The party attacked the kraken and finished off the dragon, its rider had regained composure and teleported away. The kraken was forced to flee, having fallen victim to a bard and the party swung but barely scratched its hide. Kiva was slammed again and was placed inside the kraken’s mouth, its undead beak bruising her frail form. The party came up with numerous plans while blasting the kraken, the gnome fled, leaving a fog cloud behind, having had enough of this drama. Kiva was able to escape the beak and stab the kraken, fleeing after the wound was dealt. She made it to her companions, who set forth more magic against the beast and got into better tactical positions. Kiva, Keeper, and Kroska all happened to be standing in a line and the kraken seized the opportunity, blasting its last line of lighting before it moved up to Stone. Limbsmasher threw a wall of fire on the kraken and Kadence finished the job. The party took a deep breath, healed each other back from certain death, and rested in a tiny magical hut, hopefully to be safe for the rest of the night. 

Dwarf One Shot!!


We had a game store session the night before Thanksgiving with five players, everyone else had returned home or traveled elsewhere for the night. I brought out a dusty one-shot adventure I wrote a few years ago concerning a party of dwarves leaving their clan hold to gain glory. Each player chose a premade dwarf, we had a fighter, cleric of knowledge, druid, sorcerer, and a ranger. I prewarned each player that some of the encounters might be a bit difficult only having the five party members but reminded them we had a pile of other characters just in case. 

Their mission was to use their map to find their way to a neighboring clan hold that had gone silent, and to get there before the dwarven army that left them behind. The group descended the airducts and found themselves in a chamber with goblins and combat ensued, the party was able to defeat them with only a few scary hits and found some healing mushrooms. They made their way down an adjoining tunnel and found an underground highway lined with giant mushrooms. They looked north and south trying to figure out which way to go and remembered the map pointed south. They encountered strange reptilian wolves that looked trained and could hear boots behind them quite a way off with more barks following. They fought off the three wolves and made their way to a strange stone mushroom that had a secret door behind it, letting them escape before the hobgoblins could find them. They chose to rest at this point, having closed the door behind them and finding thousands of stairs ahead of them. 

After resting the party went up the stairs, finding themselves raising higher within the mountain range than they expected. They found an exit, but the sight they could see from their hidden wall was not promising, there were three half ogres sitting around their fire. The cleric decided to call out to them that he was their god, and one of the three was curious, so he put his ear to the wall. The ranger took this chance to bury his blade into the ogre’s ear through the wall’s eye slit. That ogre ran while the other two, not trusting wall god, used their axes to cut through the wall. The party set upon those two quickly disposing them but the stabbed one had run away. From the gates of the quiet dwarven city he threw a javelin at the fighter, pinning him into the wall and startling the rest of the party. This began the crazy time. As the party tried to kill this ogre both the fighter and the druid were knocked unconscious and almost killed by the ogre, while the cleric, sorcerer, and cleric knew better than getting to close. They eventually got him down and pushed the bodies off the cliff face. 

The group retreated to their broken tunnel and rested again. Eight hours later they tried the doors, which magically opened for their dwarven blood. They found the raided armory as well as the kitchen. In the kitchen they found a fat gremlin eating the old food and it barfed on them for scaring it. The gremlin tried to run away but was cut down swiftly by the party. The group made their way to the old mine area and found a dark elf with bound dwarves on a cart with hobgoblins and goblins loading more dwarves into the carts. Combat ensued and the dark elf and beetle fleeing, leaving his minions behind. The fighter charged into the room, smashing a goblin into paste. The hobgoblin near him pulled back and launched an arrow critically into the fighter’s head, killing him instantly. The rest of the party took the appearance of a paladin to their ranks well, and sent spells and arrows into the chamber, trying to save the dwarves and kill the goblinoids. They were able to clear out the monsters and save the dwarves. The adventure ended with the surviving party hearing more dwarves from their clan raiding the front of the keep and seeing webs blocking the passage the drow had taken his captives. It was fun to run this adventure again but it still needs some tweaking.

Thursday, November 15, 2018

Untamed Wilds Session 18


The party was instructed by their leaders, the elder council to investigate the strange mountain by the lake mentioned by the witches on their last adventure. Yuukakaral the artificer harpy, Kadence, Stone, Kiva, Chance, Mai, Jewell, and Japachi made their way across the countryside, passing into giant land and heading for a dead forest that borders the lake and the mountain. 

In the middle of their path was a strange cloaked figure with skin pulled tight against its skull. The party called out to it and it told them that if they were from Godmoot and seek Mordel, they would go no further. The party evaded admitting that was their town of origin and Mai started playing his hurdy gurdy. The creature, bored of the sounds it made and summoned a wall of skeletons and prepared for battle. Yuukakaral flew into the air and shot the figure, its cloak rolling back to reveal light blue radiance coming from its empty sockets, and they all watched as spiders and worse ran between its mouth and cloak. The Skeletons readied their weapons as Kadence, with Mai on her back, charged them, leaping at the last minute over their blockade, taking a few small spear wounds, and laid into the figure, now identified as a deathlock. Stone went to throw a fireball at the skeleton swarm and watched as another deathlock appeared, countering his spell. Kiva flew in and stabbed the caster in the gut and retreated. The second one cast a holding spell on Kiva, freezing her stiff as another deathlock appeared and started raking her with its terrible claws. The charged deathlock confused the mind of the centaur, using crown of madness, making her attacks wild and dangerous to her allies. 

They found they had not only the skeleton swarm but four actual deathlocks on the battlefield. Chance put a few arrows into the one holding Kiva, causing her to break free of the effect and Mia dropped a hypnotic pattern on the cluster including Kiva, only effecting her so Mia broke the spell. Jewell threw a few eldritch blasts at the deathlocks but they went wide. Jewell started her call lightning spell, causing bolts of lighting to strike down on a foe every round, again almost hitting Kiva again. The party fought valiantly against this force of spell casting and bashing creatures, Yuukakaral was pulled from the sky and slammed into the ground, Jewell summoned a swarm of eight Dretches to fight the skeletons, after much chaos and carnage the four deathlocks fell to the party. The skeletons were destroyed by the combined forces of the Dretch swarm and the party picking off the last few. They watched as five more deathlocks showed themselves on a nearby ridge, laughed maniacally and faded from view. 

The party rested and Jewell had her swarm of minions run off into direction they were headed to scout ahead, sending Tiny, her familiar, with them. Eventually she got word back they could see the mountain a few miles away. as the party picked up to travel more a loudly approaching monstrosity could be heard. They watched as a huge demon with a boar face and tiny terrible wings on its back bellowed at them, yelling it was contract bound to destroy them. Combat ensued as the nalfeshnee attempted to tear into the party and the attacks on the group were bouncing off the beast. Mai worked to keep the party moving away from the beast while it was using a fear aura to control the battlefield in its own way. After being hit with a hail of thorns, a vampiric touch, numerous lightning bolts, and attacked by a wizard turned t-rex, the beast eventually fell to the party, but not before it spread its fear and quite a few claws and bites. 

The group mounted up the warforged wizard and rode off into the sunset. They made good time and the t-rex popped back into wizard form as they came into sight of their goal, the mountain lair of Mordel.

Friday, November 9, 2018

Untamed Wilds session 17!


Our next adventure started with the party entering the southern woods near Cloudkeep. Their mission was to find a coven of witches and gain information from them regarding an ancient evil from the mythic past. Jewell the cat folk warlock, Yucatrill the new artificer harpy, Stone the warforged war wizard, Kadence the centaur barbarian, Limbsmasher the goliath wizard, Kiva the harpy swashbuckler, Chance the cat folk ranger, Japachi the lizardfolk druid, and Awesome Dude the harpy rogue set forth. As the party made their way into the witch infested forest Japachi noticed they were being followed. They encountered a trio of hungry displacer beasts. The combat was swift and after a few rounds one beast was dead and the two fled into the woods. 

The party argued about chasing them until they realized the artificer’s gun may have alerted most of the forest of their presence. They made to move deeper into the woods and noticed a hooded figure floating above the path in the direction they were headed. Awesome Dude attempted to diplomatically approach the figure but Kadence had already thrown a javelin at the figure. The figure collided with a nearby tree and dissipated into a cloud of bugs, leaving the javelin behind. Not liking the bug trick the party made their way to a small shack surrounded by a three-foot-tall iron wrought fence with green skulls on the corners. There was a small gate as well with a large iron lock on it. Not wanting to be impolite, half the party hid in the trees, while a few other members went up to see if they could get a better look.

Stone knocked on a plate of metal on the fence near the lock and after a few moments an eight-foot-tall woman in a fashionable dress came out of the shack. She greeted the party and asked why there were here and started sniffing the air, counting the travelers by smell. They mentioned the crypt and what they saw there, the dark tendrils of energy, the undead giant, and other important information. She told them to look under the mountain near the large lake within the giant lands, if anyone was hiding a giant pyramid from the old times it would be there, and that old undead creature loved his pyramids. She asked the party what they would give her, now that she had given them very good intel. The party joked about giving her Awesome Dude, but there was a popping noise and three more witches showed up on their side of the fence. Combat ensued and trouble was had. Kadence became grappled after charging one of them, Kiva was hit by a tree wielded by one of the others, and the spell casters had the misfortune of standing near the other one. the artificer harpy attempted to fly over the fence, he was successful but also took necrotic damage, having passed through a magical barrier that was unnoticed by the group. 

The skulls lit up as well and seemed to be charging up for something. In the battle the artificer attempted to rise above the witch inside the fence and shot her a few times with his thunder gun, also he found the top of the dome, took some more necrotic damage and tried not to die, he knew if he passed out, he would fall back through the dome again and take damage from the fall too. The two green skulls came after the party, snapping at them with their terrible teeth but were mostly defective. Kiva tried to give the witches her bone and gold goblet of blood she had found in the last adventure as payment for the information. She dropped one of them on a witch and it just hit her with a tree again. The lead witch approached the fence and pulled the goblet through the barrier with a mage hand and cackled madly. Jewell blasted one of the three witches over the fence, forcing it to take damage. It got back up and came back around using the gate at the front. At this point two of the witches had fallen and the lead witch and her surviving sister thanked the party for the entertainment, defeating their two lesser sisters, and the goblet. They left and went back into their shack and the skulls pretty much just bit at their ankles until the group broke them. 

Confused the party packed up and started their journey home. They camped out for a bit in a clearing near a stream and Jewell sent her familiar out to scout the area. He found a sickly-looking tree with a face and realized it was a sickly diseased tree giant. The party found out from Jewell what was out there a moment before a large boulder bounced behind the camp. The party, knowing trees hate fire launched fireball after fireball at the tree and its two allies, burning the surrounding forest as well as destroying the animate trees. It was a quick battle with five fireballs in two rounds. The party survived and now has a lead on where to find this undead threat and where their old ranger Striker might have been taken.

The party is now 8th level 

Wednesday, October 31, 2018

Untamed Wilds Session 16!


Our session started with secrets. The Raven ranger and I explored his fate and if the party ever finds him, we can sort things out then. We had a reasonable number of players tonight, we had Stone the war forged war wizard, Kadence the centaur barbarian, Jewel the cat folk warlock, Mai the satyr glamor bard, Kiva the harpy swashbuckler rogue, and Red the blood hunter cat folk. The party was hired by Keyhaw, a traveling satyr folk hero, to go deal with this upstart satyr king figure people had been talking about. It seems he had raised an army of displeased fey and monsters and was planning to attack Godmoot, the city under the party’s protection, and where they live. Keyhaw gave them a route up the mountain where the party could negate most of the army and either ask the satyr king to leave Godmoot alone, or exterminate him. They set off up the mountain, watching for ambushes along the way. They saw strange glowing fey flitting about on the periphery, strange out of season gourds and fruit on parts of the path, and strange drawings etched into the rocks that seemed to watch them as they traveled up the mountain. 

Their first contact with the enemy was Red spotting three large dogs covered in flames. They were a decent distance from the group and only he could see them. So he shot them. Three oversized hell hounds noticed the party and attacked. The group made quick work of them and none were able to sound an alarm, only suffering from a few flame blasts along the way. They gathered their team and headed further up the mountain. 

Jewel sent her familiar ahead and it noticed two floating skulls, dripping with putrid chunks of flesh and leaving a trail where they flew. The creatures had four eyes, each switching to a different color in sync with the other. Tiny, the familiar, heard the skulls talking about guard duty and laughing in Abyssal and reported back to the party. The monsters suffered a surprise attack, loosing a few rounds to careful planning of the party and Mai using hypnotic pattern to remove the skulls from the battle. The party ganged up on one skull and were planning to take them out one at a time. They attacked the closer one first, taking turns dealing massive damage but another skull rose from the ground and headbutted one of the stunned ones. The group was suddenly dealing with three angry skull monsters with eye beams. The first victim was Jewel, she was hit with a enervating ray taking over a quarter of her health in damage. The next was Kadence, she was paralyzed by one eye beam and hit with a disintegration beam by the other. The tables had turned. The group worked together, Kiva attacking from a hidden position and fleeing after striking, Red launching powerful elemental arrows into the enemies, Stone dropping a fireball on top of the skulls and hasting the centaur, Kadence using three attacks a turn to slice up each and every one of the skull bastards, Mai changed the battlefield to give more advantageous positions to the party, and Jewel pushed the skulls further and further away from the party, keeping them at bay. Eventually the skulls died and the party rested for a bit, Mai granting everyone temporary hit points before they took their breather. 

The group made their way to the top of the mountain and saw a large satyr shaped figure with an iron helm sitting on a metal throne with a huge muscular serpent man bodyguard. Mai attempted to bard the Satyr King and found him unyielding in his position, Mai was offered blood looking wine, in keeping with tradition. Mai threw the first glass’s contents over his shoulder, hitting a frail satyr with runes across his body in the face with the blood, and noticed another frail satyr behind the throne. The Satyr King did not take kindly to this and nodded to his bodyguard. Combat was joined and the party got to see what the body guard could do, they focused all their firepower on him, Stone dropping a fireball on the duo and the minions, causing no damage to the Satyr King, frying one of his henchmen, and scorching the serpent. Kiva ran in and stabbed the serpent, which followed her and slammed in with three scimitar attacks, causing he to lose most of her hit points. Mai was attacked by the Satyr King, who lashed out with a tail attack and two stabs with an iron pitchfork summoned from the ether. The remaining henchmen ran up and poked Mai for one damage. The focus of the party became dropping everything into the snake, and it eventually fell to the onslaught of Kadence, hasted again and swinging with three attacks a round. The Satyr King looked at the party, said well done, and teleported away leaving the party nursing plenty of wounds and more questions. Keyhaw showed up to give the group some money for their troubles and the night ended.

If you are feeling generous please check out my Ko-Fi page https://ko-fi.com/bookgnomerob to help me keep making these games awesome. In the future I hope to be able to do write ups like this for every game I run. Every little bit helps.

Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Untamed Wilds Session 15!


Recently strange figures have been seen digging plots across the countryside. Tonight was no different. The party traveled to a strange graveyard they had seen many weeks back and found a fire giant and his allies digging in the graveyard. The party consisted of the goliath wizard, half-orc barbarian, harpy swashbuckler, cat folk ranger, lizard folk druid, satyr bard, cat folk rogue/barbarian, centaur barbarian, raven folk ranger, cat folk blood hunter, and cat folk warlock. The stealth team of raven folk ranger, harpy swashbuckler, cat folk blood hunter, and cat folk barbarian broke off the main force and snuck their way into a position to see the giants better, noticing the fire giant leader, his two fire ogre minions, and a strange huge cloaked figure. The rest of the party grouped together in the shadow of the ruins and waited for a signal. Before they attacked they heard a voice telling the giants they were close to finding him, which did not make sense. 

The raven opened fire and hit the cloaked figure a few times, and combat began. Over the combat the cloaked fomorian giant became prone thanks to the bard’s quick use of command and the fire giant was sent elsewhere by the wizard. As the party tore into the remaining ogres and the prone giant they heard the voice call out again and the ground shook, releasing foul clouds of harmful vapors into the air. The party avoided most of the damage but the casters focusing on their spells lost them. The giant ran over to the wizard that had banished him and with two swift strikes knocked him unconscious. The tide started to turn towards the monsters again, but the gravity of the situation was complicated by the bard making the fire giant fall over laughing and a wave of water from the druid knocking foes prone. The barbarians grouped up on foes, trying to slay them as quickly as possible. The party was also surprised to find that fire ogres explode when killed, they had been seeing flames in their blood and were able to put two and two together right before the first one popped. The harpy dive bombed the fire giant when it got back up and afterwards fled into the sky, only to get attacked by an undead fire dragon. They killed the fire dragon and were able to bring down the fire giant while it ran towards the hole they had been digging. 

As it died its sword fell into the hole and a crack was heard. Foul tendrils of dark magic pulled out of the hole and latched on to the dead giant. The party laid into him more damage hoping to stop whatever was happening as well as chugging magic healing potions, knowing whatever happened next might be rough. The centaur stole his sword, dragging it across the battle field. The giant stood up, flesh falling from its face and arms. It blasted the raven with lightning which arced into the cat folk barbarian/rogue as well. The giant reached for the sarcophagus and started lifting it out from the hole in the ground but was knocked back down with magic, falling prone and dropping the raven into the pit. The group piled up more hits on him and the warlock lobbed a fireball onto the giant, which was immune to fire damage, and burned the cat barbarian/rogue as well as the raven. When the giant was able to act he grabbed the sarcophagus again and teleported away, the raven had been holding on as well, and now is where ever the giant ended up. The rest of the party looked for loot, and found nothing but broken stone, the giants huge sized great sword, and questions.

Thursday, October 18, 2018

Book Gnome Reading list

Here is my list of favorite and recommended books over my decade in book selling. The books listed are the first books in the series, I always recommend reading the first book first in any series.



Young Reader Books: ages 9-14
Amulet, by Kibuishi *
Artemis Fowl, by Colfer
Aru Shah and the End of Time by Chokshi
Athena the Brain, by Holub
Bad Unicorn, by Clark
Bone, by Smith*
Candy Shop War, by Mull
Charlie Bone, by Nimmo
Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder, by Nesbo
Dragons Tooth, Wilson
Emerald Atlas, by Stephens
Fablehaven , by Mull
Fairy Tale Detectives, by Buckley
Golden Compass, by Pullman
Goblin Secrets, by Alexander
Graveyard Book, by Gaiman
Gregor the Overlander, by Collins
Harry Potter, by Rowling
Hollow Earth, by Barrowman
House of Secrets, by Columbus
How to Train Your Dragons, by Cowell
Land of Stories, by Colfer
Lightning Thief, by Riordan
Lockwood & Co, by Stroud
Loki’s Wolves, by Armstrong
Magyk, by Sage
Maze of Bones, by Riordan
Middle School by Patterson
Narnia, by Lewis
Ophelia and the Marvelous Boy, by Foxlee
Peculiar, by Bachmann
Pendragon, by MacHale
Red Pyramid, by Riordan
Redwall, by Jacques
Ruins of Gorlan, by Flanagan
Scepter of the Ancients, by Landy
School for Good and Evil, by Chainani
Search for WondLa, by DiTerlizzi
Serpents Secret by DasGupta
Sherlock Cottages by Brinnington
Sidekicks, by Santat *
Spiderwick Chronicles, By DiTerlizzi and Black
Sword of Summer, by Riordan
Theodore Boone, Kid Lawyer, by Grisham
Three Times Lucky, by Turnage
Thrones and Bones, by Anders
Tunnels, by Gordon
WildWood, by Meloy
World Without Heroes, by Mull
*Graphic Novels

Teen Books: ages 12 and up
5th Wave, by Yancey
Alchemyst, by Scott
City of Bones, by Clare
Enders Game, by Card
Eon, by Goodman
Eragon, by Paolini
Fault in Our Stars, by Green
Fellowship Of The Ring , by Tolkien
Graceling, by Cashore
Hobbit, by Tolkien
Hunger Games, by Collins
Last Apprentice, by Delaney
Leviathan, by Westerfield
Looking Glass Wars, by Beddor
Sea of Trolls, by Farmer
Steelheart, by Sanderson
The Naming, by Croggan
Vladimir Tod, by Brewer

Chapter Books:
Beast Keeper by Coats
Beast Quest by Blade
Boris by Joyner
Dragon Masters by West
Goosebumps, by Stine
Ivy and Bean by Barrows
Magic Tree House by Osborne
Never Girls by Thorpe
Ricky Ricotta’s Mighty Robot by Pilkey
  
Adult Books:
13 ½ Lives of Captain Blue Bear, by Moers
Age of Myth, by Sullivan
American Gods, by Gaiman
Call of Cthulhu, by Lovecraft
Dangerous Women, by Martin and Dozois
Darkness Forged in Fire, by Evans
Dragonflight, by McCaffrey
Dragons of Autumn Twilight, by Weis
Eliminster: Making of a Mage, by Greenwood
Game of Thrones, by Martin
Heir to the Empire, by Zahn
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, by Adams
Homeland, by Salvatore (Drizzt series)
Hounded, by Hearne
Lies of Locke Lamora, by Lynch
Magicians, by Grossman
Name of the Wind, by Rothfuss
Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Gaiman
Practical Demon Keeping, by Moore
Princess Bride, by Goldman
Ready Player One, By Cline
Red Shirts, by Scalzi
Storm Dancer, by Kristoff
Swords and Deviltry, by Lieber
The Fifth Civilization, by Bingham-Pankratz
The R.X. Problem, by Magnusson
Theft of Swords, by Sullivan
The Thousand Names, by Wexler
Vector Prime, by Salvatore (Star Wars)
Way of Kings, by Sanderson
Wizard of Earthsea, by Le Guin

Picture Books:
Animalia by Base
Caps for sale by Slobodkina
City Dog Country Frog by Willems
Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Willems
Dragons Love Tacos by Rubin
Edda by Auerbach
Extra Yarn by Barnett
Flora and the Flamingo by Idle
Grandpa Green by Smith
Heart and the Bottle by Jeffers
I Want My Hat Back by Klassen
Instructions by Gaiman
Journey by Becker
Julia’s House for Lost Creatures by Hatke
Kid Sheriff and the Terrible Toads by Shea
Knuffle Bunny by Willems
Meet the Parents by Bently
Monster’s Monster by McDonnell
Penguin and Pinecone by Yoon
Pirate, Viking, & Scientist by Chapman
Puff the Magic Dragon by Yarrow
Stinky Cheese Man by Scieszka
Stuck by Jeffers
Tea Rex by Idle
The Adventures of Beekle by Santat
The Book With No Pictures by Novak
The Circus Ship by Van Dusen
The Dark by Snicket
The Day the Crayons Quit by Daywalt and Jeffers
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore by Joyce
This Book Just Ate My Dog, by Byrne
We Are In a Book by Willems
Where the Wild Things are by Sendak
Wilfred by Higgins