The girls want more hack 'n' slash. There was also some mumbling about switching characters. So, to give them what they wanted, I ran a Friday night dungeon delve based on the 18 volume collection of 5 room dungeons found here:
http://www.roleplayingtips.com/articles/5_room_dungeons.html
The group had the usual rogue, ranger, and paladin. The cleric was replace by a quirky little gnome bard played by S. The not-so-smart fighter was replaced by a very stupid half-orc barbarian played by V.
No computer tonight. I drew the map on a battle grid as we went. I had 3 sheets of paper describing the 5 rooms on which I had scribbled all the monster stats. Part of tonight's goal was also to show the players a method that they could DM by in the hopes that I might get to play some day.
The first room they found a green dragon (very small). This freaked them out a bit, since all previous encounters with dragons had either killed PCs or had been a conversation as part of a larger campaign. The acid breath weapon quickly got them serious. They all hacked and slashed as best they could until the dragon dropped -- final blow from the rogue!?!
The dragon's hoard wasn't massive but pleased the PCs.
Jerry Flameblade, the half-orc, quickly got the memorable line "Boom! Boom!" going through the fight. Later this became a question ("Boom-boom?") for him to ask if he could hit stuff. Great character play.
"Go get 'em Jer-ry"
The second room was a riddle room. Standing around and trying to solve a riddle is always anticlimactic in a dungeon delve, so I added a little haste by adding a golem to the room. A couple of slams from the golem and the group was motivated. The paladin finally yelled out the riddle's answer and the golem went back to resting position and a magic secret door opened.
Room 3 was my personal favorite. The party snuck down a winding passage into a long hall of a room with a porticullis at the other end of it. The door slams shut behind them. They don't all see the lurking cube of acidic jello known as a gelatinous cube. The paladin and bard find themselves quickly engulfed and paralyzed while the other 3 slowly hack away at it.
The porticullis presents a bit of a problem with a magical auto-re-arming trap. After it is set off a couple of times, drenching the adventurers in fire, Jerry whacks it with his great sword and kills the lock, letting them move into a room with a sarcophagus.
There is much debate, especially from the paladin, about opening the sarcophagus, since it is a tomb. The need to find the 5th room persists and they open it to be surprised by a few rats. The climb down a secret ladder into the room below.
In the room, they find a gauth, little brother to the beholder, guarding the treasure. The gauth, a floating one-eyed head with eye stalks that shoot magic spells is a scary opponent. Between getting blasted, paralyzed, and stunned, the adventurers slowly are able to approach the monster and hack it until dead. Again the rogue deals the final blow (two in one night!?!).
The treasure is filled with good artifacts and riches and a couple of hundred wigs, which the paladin finds most amusing. I wonder how many of the crew will appear in the next adventure wearing wigs.
Overall the delve was a great success. The rogue finally figured out how to check for traps. The players got to hack some serious solitary monsters (before they were usually attacking groups of minor monsters). I got to try out an old fashion dungeon delve with my new DM "screen", that I'll introduce in another post.
-DM Dad
http://www.roleplayingtips.com/articles/5_room_dungeons.html
The group had the usual rogue, ranger, and paladin. The cleric was replace by a quirky little gnome bard played by S. The not-so-smart fighter was replaced by a very stupid half-orc barbarian played by V.
No computer tonight. I drew the map on a battle grid as we went. I had 3 sheets of paper describing the 5 rooms on which I had scribbled all the monster stats. Part of tonight's goal was also to show the players a method that they could DM by in the hopes that I might get to play some day.
The first room they found a green dragon (very small). This freaked them out a bit, since all previous encounters with dragons had either killed PCs or had been a conversation as part of a larger campaign. The acid breath weapon quickly got them serious. They all hacked and slashed as best they could until the dragon dropped -- final blow from the rogue!?!
The dragon's hoard wasn't massive but pleased the PCs.
Jerry Flameblade, the half-orc, quickly got the memorable line "Boom! Boom!" going through the fight. Later this became a question ("Boom-boom?") for him to ask if he could hit stuff. Great character play.
"Go get 'em Jer-ry"
The second room was a riddle room. Standing around and trying to solve a riddle is always anticlimactic in a dungeon delve, so I added a little haste by adding a golem to the room. A couple of slams from the golem and the group was motivated. The paladin finally yelled out the riddle's answer and the golem went back to resting position and a magic secret door opened.
Room 3 was my personal favorite. The party snuck down a winding passage into a long hall of a room with a porticullis at the other end of it. The door slams shut behind them. They don't all see the lurking cube of acidic jello known as a gelatinous cube. The paladin and bard find themselves quickly engulfed and paralyzed while the other 3 slowly hack away at it.
The porticullis presents a bit of a problem with a magical auto-re-arming trap. After it is set off a couple of times, drenching the adventurers in fire, Jerry whacks it with his great sword and kills the lock, letting them move into a room with a sarcophagus.
There is much debate, especially from the paladin, about opening the sarcophagus, since it is a tomb. The need to find the 5th room persists and they open it to be surprised by a few rats. The climb down a secret ladder into the room below.
In the room, they find a gauth, little brother to the beholder, guarding the treasure. The gauth, a floating one-eyed head with eye stalks that shoot magic spells is a scary opponent. Between getting blasted, paralyzed, and stunned, the adventurers slowly are able to approach the monster and hack it until dead. Again the rogue deals the final blow (two in one night!?!).
The treasure is filled with good artifacts and riches and a couple of hundred wigs, which the paladin finds most amusing. I wonder how many of the crew will appear in the next adventure wearing wigs.
Overall the delve was a great success. The rogue finally figured out how to check for traps. The players got to hack some serious solitary monsters (before they were usually attacking groups of minor monsters). I got to try out an old fashion dungeon delve with my new DM "screen", that I'll introduce in another post.
-DM Dad
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