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| Sever, Fluid, Giuseppe, and Sheamus in the Temple of Kangsta Wrapper |
Introduction
Timekeeping
This session began on October 16th, 2025, with the player characters adventuring until the end of the 20th. Downtime for these characters begins on the 21st.
Player Characters Present
Sever the Wrathful (Level 9 Pegasus Corps Ranger of Machodor, wielder of Were'shbane and wearer of the Girdle of Cloud Giant Strength, rider of Mustang) with henchmen Thomas (C6), and Rabbit (FMT 445)Fluid the Druid (Level 9 Druid, "Scourge of Trollopulous", former wearer of the Ring of Kings)Giuseppe (Level 8 Paladin of Rome, Brovenloft, wielder of the Dragonslayer and the Shield of Protection from Missiles, rider of Bonecrusher) with henchmen Bishoy (F6) and Tawadros (F6)Sheamus (Level 8 Irish Fighter from Brovenloft, rider of the Rocket Cycle and wielder of the Drewblade)
Downtime
Session Report
The heroes set off to retrace their route to Trollopulous and passed the day in silence--still brooding over the fake treasure map.
Next morning they were wakened by the approach of what turned out to be a large group of grugs, after a brief exchange of information the party continued, reaching the outskirts of the Trollopulous without incident. There they found Bishoy and Tawadros with the Manticores (Giuseppe's mounted crossbow men) well dug in to a nice little spot that was now also occupied by guards from the city who were trying to impress the paladin with their dedication (and through him the Overlord).
The two dervish were happy to see their lord, who they had faithfully served for two years since converting to Lawful Good alignment, but they were also agitated over a shared dream in the night. They believed the dream to be a real communication from their brother dervish back in Brovenloft, most likely using the temple in the Street of Gods as a conduit. They implored Giuseppe to go there and investigate.
Even though this was also something the Overlord had asked of them, the heroes were a little bit unsure of the wisdom in taking this course of action, but they entered to the city (without tipping the "Erinyes" guards, to their disappointment) and made their way through the evening streets of Trollopulous to the Temple of Kangsta Wrapper. Here men who had bound themselves head to toe in linen bandages were handing out fliers and rhyming very poorly.
Sever greeted this with a sneer.
Though the deceased mummy himself had been evil, it seems that he had made a good impression on at least some of the survivors in Trollopulous and these worshipers, and the people as a whole in fact, were not themselves evil.
And once the powerful adventurers had indicated an interest, the priests were very happy to put them up for the night and allow them to use the portal—which they explained was the source of the commotion, in the morning.
During the night however, some drunken revellers (off-duty city watchmen in fact) woke everyone up banging on the front doors of the temple with rhymes that even the priests would disown. This encounter was neutralised—after a fashion, when Sever punched out the leader, a sergeant. City watchmen sergeants can be 3rd level you know, so this one survived to tell the tale, but only after he and his friends decided to take their fun elsewhere.
In the morning the party filled up on supplies made other such preparations. The Manticores, having not seen any action for a while, indicated that they were very happen to accompany Giuseppe on this planet hopping mission, and it will be interesting to see if any of them make it back alive.
The portal activated with a whoosh, and the party rode through, finding themselves in the oppressive heat of the dry domains, south of the deep desert, but still a desert with all the discomfort that entails.
There was no dervish contingent to welcome them, but there were broken weapons and other signs of battle. The ground nearby was inexplicably damp, and large webbed footprints were evident—these were all heading in a north-north east direction, so the party set out to follow them.
Sever sent up Rabbit to reconnoitre invisibly, the half-elf returned after an hour with a report of a dark area of vegetation ahead of their line of march. Also, flying creatures could be seen over the same area, though they were too far away for him to identify.
It was about this time that Sheamus made a disturbing discovery, planar travel had broken the connection between the rocket cycle and the recharging energy station at Castle Irish, and the battery was no longer getting its remote top up of power. He would have to be very careful not to exhaust the battery while still in the desert.
The party kept heading north, and after some hours the dark area of vegetation identified by Rabbit had grown to block the horizon. It was a swamp, yes a desert swamp! Not only that, griffons were nearby and—with the wind coming from an unfortunate angle—they could smell the party's horses.
Combat #1: Ten Griffons
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Rounds: 5
Result: Party winHighlights: The Manticores turned out to be very handy, in that their horses provided a focus for the attention of the attacking griffons, four were killed and carried off by the second round of combat. The remaining griffons engaged the likes of Sever, Sheamus, and Giuseppe, with the former two battering the great beasts into unconsciousness, while the paladin showed no mercy to the one which savagely clawed Bonecrusher.
Somewhat side-tracked by the prospects of a captive griffon, Sever and Sheamus spent some time repeatedly beating the creatures senseless until they finally quieted down and deigned to eat some of the humans' rations. These were not exactly to their taste, but between the ropes and rough handling they gave up trying to escape, for the moment.
With night approaching they reached the edge of the swamp. Fluid made a very careful effort collecting samples to create an Hallucinatory Forest that matched the make up of the trees in the swamp. This would pay dividends in more ways that one.
Combat #2: 10 Frogmen
Rounds: 2 Surprise segments, 3 rounds
Result: Party winHighlights: Sheamus was on watch, but the frogmen achieve surprise with their mighty leaps. They didn't all concentrate on the Irishman though and attacked targets sleeping nearby, those with dexterity reaction adjustments were safe once they were awake.
The creatures started well—getting the drop on the Irishman, but were immediately on the back (webbed) foot once the party were up and fighting. They attempted to withdraw, but found that—to their great surprise—they were no longer on swampy ground, Fluid's ruse had convinced them otherwise; and so they could only withdraw at their slower speed of 3" a round. The party overwhelmed them—all the ones to be seen at any rate—before they could recover from this mistake.
Rejecting a hot pursuit into the swamp at night, the heroes instead chose to wait until morning. Someone had the idea of feeding the griffons the dead frogs and, by the magic of reaction rolls, it turned out that they LOVED eating frogs, the beasts became much more manageable. But then, as the next day dawned, the random weather generator took a hand and bad weather struck, a terrible sand storm blotted out the sky. They couldn't take to the air even it they had wanted to (neither could their griffons, which was a silver lining). The choice was to either hunker down in their camp and wait out the storm, or proceed into the swamp; they chose the latter.
The party readied themselves, Sheamus tethered his captured griffon in front of the rocket cycle; using the beast to save battery power. Bonecrusher, healed from the previous fighting, stood by impassively, knowing its magic horse shoes would be a boon in either terrain. Fluid changed shape into a Poodle, which I had no idea was actually a good idea. Once they were ready they plunged into the swamp.
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| DMG p49 |
From here they were able to continue in a roughly north east direction, risking getting lost; but, in a great piece of fortune, encountered "Men" in the swamp before this happened. This encounter result could only mean one thing, a remnant of the Dervish force even I didn't know about! There were 50 men, on foot, trudging through the swamp, led by cousins of Bishoy and Tawadros—named Tawbish and Shoytaw, and they were very happy to find their relatives here.
The dervish troop had been searching for fellow survivors after the frogmen had defeated them in battle. They told how one moment they had been camped in the desert, and that night had awoken with a swamp right next to their position, and from it Frogmen attacked in great leaps, some of them themselves mounted on giant frogs! Many horses and camels, not to mention men, had been lost, but many also escaped, including their cleric and magic-user. The group had been attempting to find the others, but had been just about to turn back when they stumbled on the party. They gave the captured griffons, and rocket cycle, a wide berth, and led the adventurers back via a blazed trail to their camp; a hidden supply cache in a rocky outcrop just above the water level.
Session Statistics:
Combats: 2
Rooms mapped: 0
Combat rounds: 8
Losses: 4 horses
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