Encounters Recap: Session 8

This session of Encounters finds our heroes descending deeper into the Underdark, and once again the game was played on an unusual map. Apparently, the denizens of these caverns (in this case, drow and their goblin slaves) had hollowed out a stalactite and turned it into a extremely defensible stronghold. It was an interesting visual, but it took several explanations by our DM for everyone to get what was going on - a picture of the structure itself might've been helpful.

I imagined something like this. The description also mentioned

that there were rows of windows glowing with an unholy red light. 

Spooky!

The map was divided into three parts, representing the three internal levels of the stronghold - the large top floor where we entered (the top of the stalactite), the smaller middle floor where the end of the encounter played out, and a tiny lower floor that lead to the exit. Below the stalactite, a giant web acted as a safety net... just kidding! Anyone who fell off was going to get chomped by an enormous spider. And since it's D&D, the only paths between the levels were on the outside. Drow engineering at it's finest.

My table ended up staying waaaaaaaaaaay past the usual time, for a couple of reasons. First of all, we had two newbie players - like, "played once in my life" newbies. Secondly, the DM wanted us to help them level up their pre-gen characters. It was a nice intention, but in the end I think it just made things more confusing. The biggest reason it took so long, and this is an unfortunate possibility in D&D, is that we were all rolling complete crap.

Speaking as a DM, it's hard to know what to do when your players - or even worse, just one of your players - is consistently getting terrible dice rolls. There are some mechanical "fixes," like Heroic Effort (which lets you add 4 to your attack) and Elven Accuracy (which lets you re-roll a terrible result), but not everyone has them and they're only good for one use per encounter. In my home campaigns, I've instituted the Nightly Re-Roll - anyone can re-roll once per night. On one memorable occasion, they were doing so poorly that I allowed them one re-roll per encounter. If a player is really close to hitting, I might have them roll and Athletics or Acrobatics check as a minor action to "help guide their attack."

Usually, however, I try to do things "behind the screen." You don't want to seem like you're being too easy on your players, so as not to cheapen their victory. Sometimes I'll forget to use a monster's regeneration power, or I'll neglect to recharge their most badass attack. That's why I hate players who try to sneak in a re-roll or add bonuses they shouldn't have - there's no need to cheat! Mama's got this.

Touch of Madness Campaign

For the second of my D&D groups, I am a lazy lazy DM that primarily runs modules. Currently I am running the Touch of Madness module, the first installment of the so-called Madness Trilogy (along with Depths of Madness and Brink of Madness). As you might suspect, it primarily involves monsters from the Far Realm, who specialize in being batshit insane and inspiring batshit insanity in others. SPOILERS BELOW.

Oh, and tentacles. Mustn't forget the tentacles.

Our group changes all the time (people join, people leave, schedules conflict, etc), so right now I am allowing more than one character per person. This allows us to play with as few as two players and one DM, but is not recommended for inexperienced players. But guests are always welcome, because I believe in recruiting people to my twisted lifestyle.

The last time we met, Kevin brought along his friend Andrew - he had played before, and just needed a refresher on a few things and the nuances of 4E. I created a character for Andrew in character builder - I decided to go the Essentials route, to save myself some time. Approximately five decisions later, I had a fully-functional 10th-level Dwarf Cleric, with only one easily-correctable error (they gave him expertise in a weapon he didn't have). Kevin is playing a Dragonborn Paladin, and Reuven dual-wielded his Dwarf Fighter and his brand-new Shifter Monk.

So far in the plot, our adventurers are seeking to protect the people of Wellspring from an uncertain threat - the story began when grells descended upon the town. They have been lead to the Forlorn Tower - formerly a temple to Ioun (D&D goddess of knowledge) and home of the Tear of Ioun, one of many sacred relics. In this session, the party was supposed to speak to a woman who had been sent after the Tear of Ioun and who knows more about it's whereabouts. However, when they came upon her party they immediately attacked - which, to my mind, was a valid decision. You're a grimlock hanging out in an evil tower, and the group just fought a whole bunch of you two sessions ago. Of course Han is going to shoot first!

On the left, a grell. On the right, a grimlock. 

Seriously, what the hell.

This left me in something of a quandary - I needed to let them get their hits in without sacrificing exposition. Also, we were down one PC, and this was a high-level encounter. If I had let them fight it out, the heroes may not have survived. I know that's OK with some DMs, but I think TPKs are boring and pointless. The story advances when the heroes advance - why would I want to stop that?

I compromised by giving hints that the grimlock's leader, who announces herself as Denva of the Stormcrows, was not quite right in the head (which was true). Our Paladin was the only one who was close enough to interact with her, which was probably not ideal - even though every player was involved in the battle in some way or another, only one got to do any Skill stuff. The small exception was that our Fighter got to use his Athletics to smash through a wall - and eventually made it!

When they had subdued most of the grimlocks and successfully navigated Denva's warped mind, they find out quite a bit. 

[Denva] reveals that a human named Cylus hired her and her companions to search for the Tear of Ioun. The relic transformed the Stormcrows (a group of merry mercenaries), but then mysterious shadow creatures stole it. Elomir, the Stormcrow leader, sent the grells to Wellspring. He won’t stop searching until the stone is recovered.

In other words, "Sorry - your relic is in another castle." Denva tells the adventurers where to find Elomir (at the top of the tower, duh!) and begs them to take her to Wellspring for treatment. They came up with the clever idea to enlist the help of the Half-orc natives of the nearby forest, the Harrowfolk, to help Denva reach the town. After a short rest, they plan to forge ahead - up the stairs!

Encounters Recap: Sessions 6 and 7

I skip one lousy session of Encounters, and I find out later that they did two encounters to make up for missing the holiday. Boo! Luckily, my BGF Mac was in attendance - here's his recap!

--

As previously mentioned, one of the central tenets of the game is "don't split the party". Wizards apparently said "blow that for a game of soldier" for this encounter. Everyone in the party is forcibly separated, and each is faced with an individual challenge. Pro: it's something not a lot of players have seen before. Con: there's a reason we haven't seen its like before.

What ended up happening was, each person got five or ten minutes to solve their own puzzle. Since it required DM interaction and there's only one, that meant the other five people sitting around the table got to sit there and watch someone else roleplay with no ability to interact. To top it all off, several of the challenges were doubled, so in the interest of "fairness" Ozzy, for example, who was in the same type of challenge as Liz, had to walk away and not listen as she solved her challenge so he wouldn't learn the trick. My character, who is multi-talented but has NO athletic ability, was required to climb up and down ropes repeatedly.

The next session was pretty straightforward. The group as a whole was a little pressed for time, and it was an exercise in how to quickly get through the action. Most people handled it fairly well. The group of new players sitting next to us TPK'd. AGAIN. I think this brings the total to 3 TPKs out of 7 sessions, only six of which were even combat.

Encounters Recap: Sessions 4 and 5

For anyone who hasn't been playing D&D Encounters this season, it's been pretty brutal. My group of mostly experienced players has been hanging on - although we're not always great about synergizing. The mostly-newbie table at our game shop, however, has experienced TPK (Total Party Kill) twice already. Yikes.

Session 4: We descend deeper into the tower, which is clearly going to lead us into the Underdark. I mean... clearly. We came to a room divided lengthwise - on one side, a set of iron doors and the only way ahead. On the other, the lever to operate said door. Of course, villains (globins and drow warriors) were lurking on both sides of the room. To avoid being pinned between the two groups of bad guys, we decided to bend one of the central tenets of D&D: "Don't split the party." Three of us went for the lever, while the rest of the party headed fro the door. My svirfneblin warpriest, Tassen, used all of his ability to heal to keep one of the tanks alive - naturally, the other tank went down for the count. The only reason we survived was that the D&D gods saw fit to boost our party with a couple of NPC allies - the heir to the throne and her bodyguard, magically teleported to us by the benevolent (?) wizard we're working with. Sadly, they were teleported out again between this combat and the next. Happily, several of us leveled up after this session, so we were ever-so-slightly more badass.

Session 5: Once again, we faced a weridly-shaped map this session - three interconnected corridors formed a square with a slightly larger area. In that area, a drow spellcaster (one of the bosses, no doubt) took pot-shots at us from behind a porticullis before eventually running away. The battle lasted three long rounds, and we essentially bottlenecked in one section of the map. I also decided that I am completely fed up with the Cloud of Darkness power that these drow a-holes keep dropping on us. This may be because I incautiously charged into the fray and ended up, along with our goblin spellcaster, taking up the majority of damage for the party. Eventually one of our tanks managed to King's Castle to get me out of harms way (and take my place). Still, my character was down to zero hit points by the end of the encounter - luckily, it was FINALLY time for an extended rest. In going forward, I think I need to realize that I am NOT playing a defender - and that just because I'm a melee character doesn't mean I have to rush into the middle of the fray.

Why is Encoutners so tough this season? I think Wizards is recognizing that while these session are aimed at bringing new players in, Encounters is really becoming a venue for experienced players to get their game on. At the same time, I hope this isn't discouraging new players from joining in. Maybe there could be two levels of difficulty, and players get to decide while they want to play...? Just spitballing, here.

For much more comprehensive recaps, check out this blog: http://dungeonsmaster.com/dd-encounters/.

"Ill Doctrine" video re: sexist gamer dudes

Thanks to my friend Sarah F. for sharing this on Facebook. "If you need to show off your debating skills and try to make fetch happen, there's plenty of other times for that." Love it!

My personal experience with the "sandwich joke" - I enjoy cooking and baking, and I often find it useful to feed my players. They have less time to complain when their faces are full of cupcakes. Once, I was hosting and a male "friend" of mine was the only one who hadn't had dinner. Being the kind soul that I am, I offered to make him something. While I thew together some peanut butter and jelly, he stood besides me chuckling. When I asked him what was so funny, he said, "You're in the kitchen. Making me a sandwich." I didn't get it at first, but when I figured out that he found this funny because I was a WOMAN... well, it hurt. But I didn't say anything. What I should've said was, "Oh- so you wanted spit in this?"

Guess Who's Coming to the Session?

If anyone has been reading this blog, s/he may be thinking... "Hey, aren't you supposed to be a DM? When are you actually going to run a game?" Not to fret, imaginary reader. Today's post is about my D&D home campaign - written and run by yours truly.

The adventure is set in the county of Corbais, where the usual monsters of the wilderness have been making uncharacteristic attacks on towns and villages. Our heroes have defended the innocent townsfolk valiantly, and have found several strange primal magic totems attached to various monsters. They confronted the local swamp witch about this, but she fought them off and escaped. Meanwhile, an old adventurer named Reis Uleka has decided to come out of retirement to organize a fighting force, the Silver Company. In light of their dedicated service to the community, Uleka has just agreed to allow our heroes to join Silver Company. They have been assigned their first mission, to investigate some strange dealings in the village of Vervaine.

 3.5 players may recognize Uleka as an
"iconic character" from the Crivis setting...
Or not, because honestly I stumbled upon him
while trolling this D&D wiki.

For this session, we were at least than full strength - only two out of my regular five players could attend. The only two left were our cleric, played by Maggie, and our rouge, played by our friend Carly. However, Maggie also plays a barbarian that makes guests appearances in this adventure. So I decided that, before the party set off for Vervaine, that the barbarian and the rouge would participate in a local competition between strikers called The Blood Thirst Tournament. Teams of two would go head-to-head in illusory arenas... where the hazards are all too real.

A few days before we were due to play, Carly asked if her friends Katia and Alex could come and watch our game. She mentioned that they might be interested in joining us in the future. Since I'm always on the look-out for fresh meat I said, "Great, the more the merrier!" I planned to field some basic questions about how the D&D works and maybe get them interested enough to roll up a character. What I actually got were two experienced 4e players who expected that I would have characters for them to play.

Which, I did not. Neither did I have an adventure for four PCs prepared. What's a DM to do? I could have tried to throw something together on the fly, but that would have taken a big chunk out of our limited playing time. I could have asked them to simply spectate, but I couldn't imagine that would be fun for people who expected to play. So, I tried a compromise - I asked our guests to play each of the opposing teams in the tournament.

There were definite pros and cons to playing the bad guys in this scenario. The major pro is that you get to play around with a whole new set of powers each match-up. The major con is that the game is heavily weighted towards the other team. I tried to find role-playing reasons to even the playing field, but that got me accused of playing favorites. But that's part of DMing - trying to make everyone happy, and often failing.

"But you let that bad guy walk through this square!"

"He's a creature made of shadows,
and he was insubstantial at the time."

"So?"

In the end the heroes prevailed (of course) and we all had a pretty good time. Katia and Alex are planning to join us for a few sessions, which means we didn't scare them off entirely. Next time we have visitors, though, I'm going to email them myself to find out if they (a) want to actually play and (b) can bring their own characters. As Simon said to Jayne, "'Cause I don't see this working any other way."

--

Quote of the Week: "Also, I can kill you with my brain." - River Tam

D&D Encounters

If you are interested in trying out Dungeons and Dragons, but don't have friends who play, D&D Encounters is a great way to get started. The creators of D&D have made arrangements with game shop owners all over the country to host these events - they provide the materials, and the shop owners provide the space. People volunteer to be Dungeon Masters (who run the game and play the monsters) and players can just show up at the appointed time. No experience is necessary, and the creators even provide characters to play. More experienced gamers also find D&D Encounters fun because it's a set weekly game that, conversely, will not fall apart if you don't show up. You can make a lot of new friends and recruit them for your home games, as well.

D&D Encounters is divided into 13-15 week "seasons," and in each weekly session you complete one battle or "encounter." I realize that the name makes Encounters sound vaguely like a service where lonely gamers can meet a friendly yet discreet short-term companion. Trust me, it's not. At least, not that I've noticed. The downside of Encounters (besides the lack of prostitutes) is the same with any published adventure - player decisions/choices often have little impact on how the story develops. In other words, all roads lead to the top of the mountain... or into the dragon's den. For players who love combat, though, this is great - if your DM allows it, you can cut the role-playing almost entirely and get right to the "hack and slash."

This session we played the third encounter of the season, entitled "Web of the Spider Queen." The Spider Queen, or Lolth, is the goddess of a race of evil elves known as the drow who live in the Underdark, a vast network of subterranean caves and tunnels. Our mission, since we've chosen to accept it, is to find a magical amulet to prevent the drow from overrunning the nearby town. I'm playing a healer this season - while healers don't hit as often or do as much damage, they are an essential party member. At least, that's what I told myself to justify the fact that I had to use most of my healing on myself. Still, my party survived in fairly good shape, which is all that matters... right?

You can read more about D&D Encounters on the official website. Next week: Will Sri's character survive another session? Stay tuned!