Displaying items by tag: Ravenloft

We decided to forgo a long rest and press ahead with completing this level on a short rest.  We encountered two swarms of centipedes in the family crypts but found nothing of value.  The plastered over door we found last time ended up being stairs up, exiting at a trap door in the den with the stuffed wolves.  We then encountered a powerful ghoul of the lady of the house.  She was a tough fight but we prevailed.  From that, we got some treasure and miscellaneous supplies.  I think there was a cloak of protection in there.  Next, we went down into the next level. (Dan: We entered from the side secret door in the prison so we had plenty of time to look around.  Brian scared us with a skeleton in the prison that did NOT animate and attack us but we tossed cantrips from a distance just to be sure.) That ended up at an underground chamber, filled with water and the same mist we saw outside and an altar in the middle.  (Dan: the ghosts demanded a sacrifice.  I thought a rat would work and went looking in the adjacent prison.  One successful roll and one failed roll got me able to hear the rats but not see them.  Just as well, I doubt I would have been able to catch them.  It would have been worse if we had realized FG wasn't rolling the exhaustion like it was supposed to). Eventually, we triggered the shambling mound demon thing. (Dan: no way was that a Shambling Mound!  It had godly stats.  Brian said the mist vanished but when I asked for clarification he doubled down with we only knew the mist in the room vanished and we had no way to tell if the mist outside the house trapping us here was gone as well.  So we weren't even sure we could run.) It’s first round, it cast fear as a free action, at a high DC, and set two characters running.  It then knocked out another character (Dan: the half-dragon monk) with a double attack.  Its attacks and AC were super high and by round 3 it was clear we were meant to flee, not fight.  The conscious grabbed the unconscious and we transitioned to a chase escape.  We each took turns justifying a skill to aid in the group's efforts to exit, followed by a skill roll.  A couple of rounds later, after grabbing the stuff we left at the front door, we piled out into the courtyard.  It was a very Call of Cthulhu conclusion.

So, we awoke in the kid’s room in the mansion.  Those that missed a CON save started with a level of exhaustion.  (disad on all skills) There was talk of going back into the mansion to retrieve food from the downstairs kitchen.  Zolton was eager to use his new purify food and drink spell.  But we decided that we had successfully gathered enough shelf-stable food from their last game to get by.  Most everyone was eager to get on with it.  So, down the stairs we went.  We started in the well room that we ended at last time.  Ambrus started carefully opening the chests in the alcoves off that room.  The rest tried to keep out of the way while that was done although some were less successful at that than others.  Various bits of wealth were found.  In addition, we found a ledger which seemed to be a record of who was captured, how they were tortured, what was learned, and how grisly was their death.  This all happened 200 years ago.  Also found were two silvered short swords.  Loki and Ambrus both wanted them so each took one.  I think there was an eye patch with a gem on it too.  We did not take the time to detect magic or identify anything.

Unfortunately, it was a maze down there so there was no clear direction to go.  We went a way.  The halls were narrow so it was single file which made it hard to keep everyone engaged.  Kharn took the lead since he wasn’t fatigued.  He walked into a pit trap that evidently was beyond his passive perception.  Brian allowed his danger sense to give him a save for half but he still fell in.  While the fairness of this was debated, Zolton took it upon himself to go through some sort of dining room and get to the crossroads on the other side of the pit trap.  He was then surprised and attacked by 3 more ghouls.  There were the usual complaints about Brian triggering an encounter but we would have encountered it soon enough.  Since we leave no stone unturned, everything will be triggered eventually.  He was quickly knocked out and drug off.  The pit wasn’t much of an obstacle, but the narrow halls and initiative order were.  People engaged and contributed as they could.  These monsters continued doing a lot of damage for 1^st or 2^nd level characters.  Kaladin managed to make a medicine roll to revive Zolton but he was knocked out again before even getting up.  They were destroyed but damage was taken.  Loki revived Zolton with a cure wounds and then Zolton cured Kharn.  And we pressed on.

We passed stairs down from which we heard eerie music but decided to try to finish off this level first.  The next room had skeletons hanging from the walls that looked a bit like us.  (I suspect the raccoon looking one was a giveaway.)  There was also a statue of a lady that held an orb.  Kaladin also noticed a secret door behind the plaster.  But Ambrus decided to grab the orb first.  3 shadows emerged from the wall behind the skeletons and attacked.  They were easy to hit but were resistant to nonmagical damage.  Once again, they did a crap ton of damage and they drained STR.  Things were dicey but then Zolton stepped in and used his “turn undead” power which for a Light domain Cleric did area effect radiant damage which these things were vulnerable to.  He took them out.  As we debated on how to get that STR back, 4 more emerged and we started over again.  Multiple characters were knocked out and most took some STR drain.  That was most hurtful to the Barbarian. 

Arlo, who was still held back by Casper the scaredy ghost inside him, attempted to flee by way of what he assumed was a secret door into the last room.  However, that turned out to be a Mimic who quicky knocked him out.  Lancelot the dog came to his rescue and crit a couple of times.  Despite that additional threat, we managed to live through it.  And then we hit the to rest or not to rest debate.  We had only been fighting for 30 minutes but were seriously depleted.  Arlo thought the STR would return in hours, so not on a short rest.  We decided to go back to the dining room to at least take a short rest in a room that was less disturbing.  Once in there, a Grick attacked.  More damage.  The last of our spells used.  We stopped there, without the rest.  We’ll have to debate that question next time.  Short or long and where.  This is an old school dungeon with a trap or monster in each room.  It’s going to be a grind that’ll take multiple rests.  Luckily, they’ve all been dead for 200 years so there’s no hurry? Hopefully, someone will feed Kharn’s horse?        

Despite coming together on level 3 to fight the armor, we ended up spread out again.  Luckily the house was relatively small so we could rally if needed.  Brian had us roll initiative again so that we could take turns doing things out of combat.  Arlo searched the library, starting with the desk.  He found some useful things like a flint and steel and an iron key.  Next, he grabbed the empty footlockers from next door and began filling them with books that he thought were interesting or valuable.  He found one that he had to read.  (Missed a Will save.)  Evidently, it was so offensive, he was compelled to burn it in the fireplace.  Lord Q joined him in there at some point.  Loki, Kaladin, and Ambrus searched the music room and examined the dog.  They were convinced the dog was real but didn’t find anything else of note in there.  The dog seemed to not like one particular cold corner but we could not find a reason.  Kharn went back up to the 3^rd floor and searched the room the ghost was in.  The ghost did not reappear but he did notice a secret door behind a mirror.  It was the stairs up to the attic that we were looking for although it was filled with spider webs.  He grabbed a torch and headed up.  Loki joined him, feeling the music room was a dead end and having no interest in the library.  At this point, we were in two groups.  Level 2 and level 4.

Down in the library, Lord Q found a secret door behind a bookshelf.  In there were a couple of bookshelves with magical type tombs including, I think, some rituals.  I don’t think we’ve found any magical inks though.  There were also the skeletal remains of what we figure was an adventurer type.  Evidently, he had opened a chest and gotten spikes in his head for his trouble.  He did have thieves’ tools on him and some other gear that Ambrus took. He used an abundance of caution and searched.  The thief had a letter in his hand we figured he had grabbed from the chest.  It was from Lord Straud himself basically telling the head of this house that his adulterous ways had brought the curse on to him and his household.  He would be getting no aid and will reap what he sowed.  In the chest were 3 blank spells books, 3 cleric scrolls that for some reason our delusional wizard Zolton could read, the deed to the house and a windmill and a will leaving everything to Rose and Thorn.  Their searching was then interrupted by combat upstairs.

On level four, the first room had a padlock in it.  We could hear the eerie sounds of children playing but the iron key and Rogue were downstairs so Loki moved onto the next room.  It was a guest room full of webs and spiders.  Since they were small, he got the torch from Kharn and reopened the door.  However, the spiders formed into 2 spider swarms and attacked.  They did 4d4 of damage and had their usual resistances.  3 of us took significant damage (good thing we got those extra hit points).  Those below came up to help but the fight was over before they could do much.  The locked room was opened with the iron key.  It was a room for the kids.  The window was bricked shut.  When we started looking at stuff, their ghosts appeared.  One merged with Arlo and one with, I think, Lord Q.  They wanted to be put to rest i.e. their skeletal remains buried outside the house.  There was also a dollhouse of this house.  It was detailed enough to see that there was a spiral staircase from the 4^th floor down to the basement.  Since they were affecting two players, we decided to take care of that asap.  Their bones were put into their toy box and we headed down.  With a bunch of debate about whether to do other stuff along the way, we ended up at the front door.  However, that evil mist had engulfed the whole house and we decided we needed to deal with the basement before going out of the house.

We then spent a bunch of time looking into everything we’d left behind.  The first-floor den was searched.  The stuff wolves moved to watch us but never attacked.  We found two pistols and supplies that went to Loki, a shotgun over the fireplace that, with much debate, went to Kharn, and a deck of cards.  The kitchen was searched more thoroughly and any edible food was taken.  The books from the library were taken and carried somehow.  The hanging corpse was searched but no one made a decent roll so if there was anything worth finding, we didn’t find it.  The body was taken down and wrapped in a sheet for future burial.  I don’t remember if anything else was done or found.  The rest of the 4^th floor was searched.  If anything of note was found, I can’t recall. 

So, then we were finally left with the stairs down.  It was more of a dungeon than a basement and certainly larger than the house footprint.  There were multiple corridors heading in various directions.  Kharn and Loki attempted to sneak ahead a bit.  (Ambrus was still poisoned and had disadvantage on all rolls so he hung back.)  In one room, we were attacked by 3 ghouls, emerging from alcoves with rotting sleeping mats.  They had a claw that did paralysis or a bite.  Both did 10+ damage which is significant at 1^st level.  Kharn raged and was crit like 3 rounds in a row.  Luckily it was half damage and he managed to save.  Loki blasted away with his pistols so further sneaking was out.  Arlo was compelled to hide by Thorn although he was out of 1^st level spells anyway.  The next room had a well and some more alcoves.  A big ghoul emerged from it and managed to shove Kharn into the well.  Good thing he saved or that could have been dicey.  It did more damage but again, no one missed that save.  It was dropped and Kharn was pulled out.

At that point, it was approaching 1 AM.  No one was out but most everyone was below half.  We agreed to a long rest but where? We still couldn’t leave the house.  We decided to hold up in Rose and Thorn’s room which had one door and no windows.  I think we locked the door from the inside with the padlock.  We set watches but weird things kept happening right when we started to sleep.  We got the long rest and Ambrus finally recovered from the poison but everyone had to make a CON save or take 1 level of exhaustion (disad on all skill rolls).  Ironically Ambrus, after suffering through the poison all night, was the only one that saved.  However, Arlo used an inspiration die and saved on that reroll.  Ambrus gave his inspiration die to someone else (Kharn or Kaladin?) and that person also saved.  Zolton will have to save next time.  Luckily the skill-heavy house search is over and it’ll mostly be combat from here on out so maybe the exhaustion won’t be too bad? We did make it to 2^nd level.  Next game is scheduled for 3 weeks.     

We started with Paul’s Barbarian.  The leader of his clan, Madame Eva, told him to take one of the wagons, load it with extra supplies and head east.  She also gave him a small bundle that she said one of his new companions would have need of.  She said all this rather obliquely as if explaining physics to a child and expecting him to understand.  But eventually, Kharn figured out what he was expected to do.  I think he was to gather these new friends and return to Madame Eva for further instructions.  Soon after the rest of the players found themselves awakened on a lonely spooky road in the middle of nowhere.  All of them, including Kharn, have been having a reoccurring dream.  There were lots of handouts describing all this but it summarizes as such.  A land of great evil is in need of heroes to rescue it.  We’ve all been here before, reincarnating over and over again.  And then Madame Eva beckoning us to see her.  Each awoke with 2 tarot cards, describing their nature and their fate.  We had our sleeping clothes, our heirloom item, our comfort item, and those cards.  That’s it.  Except for Kharn, who was fully equipped since he’s from here.

We compared notes.  Loki the Ranger, Arlo the Wizard, Ambrus the Rogue, and Kaladin the Monk had known each other, although briefly, from the other side.  Zolton and the Triton were from completely different planes of existence.  Kharn was asked if he had any extra weapons or armor but he did not.  He did have that bundle which turned out to be Zolton’s spellbook.  (Note from Dan: Strangely Zolton is a cleric who thinks he's a wizard.  So... yeah.  Either he's nuts or that book is messing with his mind.)  Loki dug into the wagon and among the meager supplies, only found a trunk of brightly colored woman’s clothes and a big tent.  Kaladin noted the smell of death and a body was discovered.  He appeared to be a commoner carrying a letter who had been killed by wolves several days ago.  Speaking of wolves, one could be heard in the distance.  The note was examined.  Something about the town of Borovia needing help against some evil.  And a reward.  There were more discussions but when more wolf howls were heard, we hit the road.  (Note from Dan: as we left the DM revealed that a horde of wolves appeared where we had been.  Good thing we left.)  A couple of stout pieces of wood were found for poor weapons.  The extra supplies in the wagon were meager and although several had hunting and gathering skills, there were concerns about venturing off the road so dinner was sparse.  The tent was erected and watches assigned.  On the 3^rd watch, a swarm of bats attacked.  Kaladin did some serious damage  (Note from Dan: I am a monk so the damage was all from crits.  I stole them all from Kharn who couldn't roll above 4 most of the night), Ambrus got bit, several that were asleep never made it into the fight.  After a couple of rounds, the bats flew off to seek more defenseless prey.

As we entered the town, we passed a manor house surrounded by a fence.  The main house was in decent shape although the outer structures had all collapsed.  Beside it, were two children.  Rose and her little brother Thorn.  They said there was a monster in their house.  Their parents had gone into the basement to check it out and had been gone for a couple of hours.  They were worried about their little brother in the nursery up on the 3^rd floor.  In a display of well-coordinated teamwork, everyone headed in different directions.  Eventually, Brian had us roll initiative to try to get things under control.  Kaladin flew up to the 3^rd floor balcony.  Loki transformed into a cat and climbed up after him.  They went into a spooky bedroom and could hear the baby crying in the next room.  When that room was opened, the crib was empty.  And then a ghost of a sad woman appeared over the bed (Margaret).  She asked why we were there.  Kaladin explained that Rose and Thorn were concerned about their baby brother.  Did she know where he was? She was confused and concerned but at least she didn’t attack. (Note from Dan: This is the second time I ended up being the contact person for an upset ghost.  I think I'm getting pretty good at not triggering them.)

Meanwhile, the rest came in the front door.  The mudroom (Note from Dan: I had never heard of this term before. It's the room you wipe your feet and take off your shoes so you don't track things in the house) had shoes that seem to fit everyone in need of them.  Zolton found a shield on the wall which he “borrowed” as well.  A search of the house commenced.  A couple of long swords were also found on the wall.  The dining room had a fabulous feast laid out.  After two days of twigs and berries, Ambrus grabbed a plate full on his way to the next room.  But the food was so tasty, he had to sit down to enjoy it.  A round later when Arlo managed to snap him out of it, he realized it was all rotten and he was poisoned.  Another room had 3 stuffed wolves that looked surprisingly like monster tokens so that room was deferred.  It did seem to have some weapons in it.  Zolton skipped the 2^nd story and went right to the 3^rd where Kaladin and Loki were.  (Note from Dan: The ghost had blocked the door inward and Kaladin was trying to get it to lead us inward.  Loki had pulled the "I'm a cute kitten scratching on the door.  Please open it for me"  Naturally his awesome roleplaying was negated the next action when Zoltan opened the door from the other side). A suit of armor animated and tried to push him down the stairs.  He avoided that by the barest of margins.  With an actual combat started, everyone headed up there.  (They never did find a way into the basement unless the dumb waiter went down there.)  Since the armor was plate, it’s AC was high but it was soon defeated.  The good news was that the breastplate was in good enough shape for Zolton to use.  The door to the ghost room was closed and she was not seen again.  For now, anyway.  Now that everyone was together, we decided to stick together and search the 3^rd floor.

We found a body hanging from a rafter in the master bedroom.  He had a suicide note.  He was the master of the house and was apologizing to his kids for leaving them.  Evidently, his wife had done some great evil and this was his only choice.  We found another letter written by the wife, thanking a friend for her advice.  Something about extreme measures needed to rid the house of evil.  We started to think she killed her kids which would make the kids out front ghosts as well.  On her nightstand was a jewelry box that had quite a bit of wealth in it.  (Note from Dan: The DM boasted how much loot we found.  Then I pointed out that it was just about the same amount we had lost on the trip to Ravenloft.  So we are now baseline new D&D characters).  The rest of the floor was searched, avoiding the ghost room but no way up to the attic was found.  There was a balcony from which a climber could get up there however it was noted that the eerie fog seemed to be much thick up there so climbing to it was deferred.

We instead went back to the 2^nd floor.  It was searched.  One room had 4 sets of studded leather which was taken by Loki and Ambrus.  Lord Triton felt used armor was beneath him although I suspect he was holding out for medium armor.  The other thing that was found was a library.  But by this point, we were all tired and worn out by all these clues and descriptions.  We had just lost our focus so we stopped there.  I suspect the ritual books of Lord Triton and Zolton will be in there.  We still haven’t found a way up to the attic or down into the basement but there must be a way somehow.  At worst we can climb.  (Note from Dan: There was talk of flying or climbing to the 4th floor.  The ghost had explained that there was a way to the basement from the attic.  However, Brian was very clear that making our way from the balcony to the 4th floor would cross the mist.  We think going into the mist is death.) There was talk of making this place our new headquarters, especially since everyone seems to be dead, although with ghosts and bodies and as yet undiscovered evils, maybe we can do better.