DND Blog

A place to keep DND session recaps, from various campaigns.

The Seventy-Seventh Session

January 7, 2023, Campaign: As the ground quakes, evil wakes

The Party is captured by the Yuan-Ti. Jerry goes John McClane. The Captain of the Verdant Guard is revealed as an agent of Kerjes. Ryltar rescues the Party with Dimension Door. We set off in search of new equipment, reassurance that Kerjes will not go after Jerry's family, and revenge upon the Yuan-Ti.

Table of Contents

  1. A recap of the last while
  2. Last session
  3. Combat?
  4. Jerry and John McClane
  5. The Jailer
  6. Back to Jerry
  7. The Party in the Woods
  8. Jerry and Majorie reunited
  9. The second day
  10. The third day
  11. The fourth day
  12. Next Session

A recap of the last while

A vision Jerry had at the top of the mountain saw Majorie being led into a temple by Yuan-Ti. A letter intercepted by a deceased messenger said "In Majorie Trouble", and we assume it's from Kerjes. We found where Majorie was, and went off to save her. We crossed the ocean, made friends, made enemies, got teleported into the middle of the Kulahaar Wilds to tackle a strange corruption that was related to Jerry's situation. We found the source of the corruption, talked to the Jimenju Tree, located the Mother of the Forest and recovered her from the Yuan-Ti. We reinstalled the Mother of the Forest in her throne, and lifted the haze from the forest people.

Last session

The rescued prisoners from the Yuan-Ti end have been sent off to their final destinations: Setton, the forest peoples, or rejoining the West Haven contingent. The West Haven group picked up their armor and went back to the Yuan-Ti settlement, to take it over again. The Party joined them.

But lo! The Captain has betrayed the Verdant Guard and The Party by leading them into into a trap.

During the ensuing scuffle, all of the group have been downed, except:

The group are surrounded by many Yuan-Ti. And we're still in initiative order.

Combat?

  1. Round 1: Ryltar and Majorie are stabilized.
    1. The two scouts wheeze under their frozen shells.
    2. Vurguron has Blur active, and is surrounded by Yuan-Ti and his downed compatriots. He's deciding whether he wants to flee. He tries to use a Healer's Kit on Ryltar, and successfully stabilizes him. It'll be an hour before he wakes up.
    3. Jerry runs one hour around the clock face.
    4. Percival succeeds on his second death save: 1:1
    5. Majorie succeeds on her second death save: 1:1
    6. The circle of Yuan-Ti get closer.
    7. Salris uses the Healer's Kit on Majorie, knowing that she's the reason we're here.
    8. The captain of the guard is chanting: "put down your weapons, put down your weapons"
  2. Round 2: Percival and a guard are stabilized. Jerry begins her guerrilla war campaign.
    1. Vurguron counts 24 Yuan-Ti: about 12 too many for him to attempt an escape. He uses the Healer's Kit on Percival, and stabilizes him.
    2. Jerry continues to approach the group. She sees the Yuan-Ti. She's about 40 feet away, and still Pass Without Tracing
    3. Salris stabilizes one of the guards.
    4. The Yuan-Ti begin disarming the West Haveners, taking Ryltar's wand. Salris dismisses his shadow pact sword. Vurguron allows them to take away his longsword, crossbows, and other weapons. They begin to manacle the group. Basically everyone is manacled.
    5. Jerry ducks behind a tree and casts Lightning Arrow, and throws it at a group of Yuan-Ti. 17 + 9 for the target, 6 for four Yuan-ti, 3 lightning for the ten.
    6. The Yuan-Ti go into high alert and begin to spread out.
    7. Salris doesn't resist being manacled.
  3. Round 3: Jerry takes some damage, attempts to hinder the Yuan-Ti operations, and takes a little more damage. Then she runs.
    1. Two Yuan-Ti find Jerry, and make two bow attacks each against her. One hits, for 15 piercing and 5 poison.
    2. The West Haven captain says, "Stop! Stand Down! You don't want to end here!"
    3. Jerry casts Web, trapping 11 Yuan-Ti, and then stealthily moves out of the group.
    4. All the Yuan-Ti succeed against the webs, slithering out of it.
    5. Someone casts on Jerry. With a 14 Wisdom save, she passes, and escapes Hold Person, calling out, "Stop! You do not want to die in front of her today!"
    6. Ryltar sleight-of-hands the Mystery Key into his possession. It's a 5% chance of opening any lock, once.
  4. Round 4: Jerry flees; the prisoners are taken towards the city.
    1. A net flies past Jerry.
    2. They're starting to drag the unconscious prisoners towards the city.
    3. Jerry casts Pass Without Trace and moves 40 feet.
    4. One of four arrows hits her.

With a 20 + 7 + 10 stealth, Jerry disappears into the forest.

Over the next minute, the party are pushed, dragged, and shoved into the city. Those who are conscious - Vurguron and Salris - are led into the city and paraded towards the center. There is cheers and booing and rotten vegetation.

The prisoners are led up into the ziggurat, down into the temple, past the columns and fresh guards, into the main hall, where the guards strip down the prisoners to search them all for everything. Salris keisters his key. The prisoners are stripped of armor, leaving them with just their clothes.

Holes in the jail room:

There is a foot-deep puddle of water at the bottom of the cell-holes.

The rest of the other party of scouts is led into the jail room, stripped down, and chained to the walls. The captain says, "When that one wakes, I want to speak to him." He points at Ryltar.

Salris casts Prestidigitation to play the harmonica.

Jerry and John McClane

With a 25 stealth, Jerry climbs into the city and Batmans her way across the rooftops. With a natural 27 perception, she finds a straggler, away from any reinforcements. She cleaves him in twain, takes his 4 gold and dagger.

Over the next while, she takes out three Yuan-Ti walking through the town. She hides the four bodies, gaining another dagger and 8 more gold.

The Jailer

The unconscious prisoners wake up: drenched, shivering, shaken.

Ryltar listens, and hears Salris' harmonica noises. He joins in on the saxophone.

Hearing speech, the guards pull Ryltar out of his cell and lay him down on the slab, which is chanting. He's bound hand and foot. The human skulls at each corner whisper and hum. "What, you don't want to talk yet?" asks Ryltar, as the guards leave.

The captain enters. "Oh good, I wanted to talk to you again," says Ryltar.

"Now we have some private time," says the Captain. "What do you know of Kerjes?"

"In what respect?"

"How did you come to know them. What is your deal with them?"

Ryltar tells the story of Eta'el the cloud giant, and the staff, and striking a deal with Kerjes so that The Party wouldn't die. "Do you want to make a deal? I feel like making deals," says Ryltar.

"I'm done making deals," says the captain. "After this, I'm done. What does she have over you?" He means a price, a hostage, something held that is precious. Ryltar says he doesn't have anything.

And then Ryltar Dimension Doors out of the table, over to Salris, grabs him, and Dimension Doors out of the city. And then he converts some sorcery points to a fourth-level spell slot.

The captain starts running into the cell, yelling, "Where is he going! Where did he go!" to Percival, Vurguron, and really anyone else in the room.

And then Ryltar Dimension Doors back to the city, to the cell that he guesses has Vurguron in it. Next round, he Dimension Doors back out, taking Vurguron.

Percival, hearing this all, himself Dimension Doors out to the tunnel.

Ryltar Dimension Doors back to the jail room, into Vurguron's old hole, and grabs Majorie. There's the sound of keys being rattled in the lock to the room. He Dimension Doors back out. Salris is now standing guard, with his resummoned sword, and points out the three guards standing guard at the mouth of the tunnel.

(Percival is in the tunnel, but no one else knows it.)

"Where is Jerry?" And no one knows.

Back to Jerry

Another Pureblood is slain, and dragged into the shadowed darkness. What darkness? It's noon and sunny out. Jerry has a godlike stealth roll right now and the bodies are gone.

The Party in the Woods

Ryltar doesn't have an arcane focus right now, so he can't cast Message without a short bit of copper wire.

They debate how to contact Jerry. Salris decides to try Flame Strike, which takes the form of a 45' column of divine fire, which he knows that Jerry has seen.

Percival has Dimension Door himself out of the way.

Salris casts Flame Strike on the three Yuan-Ti at the entrance to the tunnel, for 4d6 fire plus 4d6 radiant = them fried. Divine fire roars down from the heavens.

Then the Party runs.

Jerry and Majorie reunited

Jerry sees this. A small gong begins to ring.

She begins to make her way out of the city, acquiring a longbow. She exits the city. It takes about three minutes to find the Party.

"Listen, Jerry, Mistakes have been made," says Ryltar. Jerry doesn't really mind; she's hugging Majorie.

Vurguron recalls his sword using Weapon bond.

We run off into the woods. Percival lags behind, not used to running, so Jerry carries him for a while.

We decide to go to the Children of the Forest. Into the evening we run, stopping at dusk. The Abracadabrus provides five Happy Meals, and all the spellcasting components we need.

Ryltar approaches Majorie that night, and apologizes to her. She understands; she's matd at the captain for his betrayal, and says that she was forced into the West Haven group that went. The forecaster wizard Ren Fallow told her that she should be in the group. Ryltar asks her about that; she isn't sure why. The captain had asked her about Jerry, about her background, about where Jerry came from.

We had not told Majorie about Kerjes. Jerry doesn't blame Majorie for accidentally endangering our family.

Ryltar says that the guard captain had asked him about Kerjes, had asked him what would make good leverage over Ryltar. If the captain was hired by Kerjes, someone relevant to him has come under her control. Our worst-case scenario is that Kerjes flies to the Yuan-Ti encampment and takes all our stuff.

Jerry says that the best case in that worst case is that the Yuan-Ti achieves godhood and fights to Kerjes with us stealing our stuff back afterwards.

Ryltar says that, with the time crunch, we do need to get all our stuff back.

And Salris points out that we do need to get back all our gold. Because of the demon, who we might need to pay at any time.

Jerry's suggestion: seed Jimenju fruit to the Yuan-Ti rations.

Our travel route:

  1. Village of the Children of the Forest, to ask permission for cairn raiding.
  2. Cairns, for gear.
  3. Barton, a small trading town upriver of Setton.
  4. Maybe Setton? If Setton, then Art, and maybe a quick portal back to our stuff. Definitely go see Ryltar's beloved.

The second day

We sleep through the night unmolested.

Many of the Party object to stealing from the cairns, even Salris, so we decide to go to the People of the Forest's village and ask permission to borrow their stuff.

Should Majorie continue with us? She's underleveled for this adventure, and kind of overwhelmed by the scenarios that she's been getting into, trying to follow in her mother's footsteps. So after some discussion, we think it would be best to send Majorie by Teleportation Circle to Ren &emdash; but Ryltar needs magic chalk to do so.

We realize that among Ryltar's stuff was the Message scroll with his girlfriend's name written on it.

By the end of the day, we start to find the little cairns of the People of the Forest. Another two and a half days. We come to a talked-about village, a large open cave going down into the earth, where the villagers would set up. But there are baskets and other things here, other signs of habitation in recent times, more recent than a year ago. There's recent smoke on the ceiling.

We push on for another hour, and then Tiny Hut for the night. Dinner and spell components come from the Abracadabrus.

The third day

Another monsoon comes in. We only travel half a day.

The fourth day

A clear travel day, Towards the end, we start to hear the Children of the Forest.

The villagers are a mix of the Touched and normal people, who ask us where the rest of the group were. We tell them that they were lost to the Yuan-Ti.

They agree to let us borrow stuff from the cairns of people who have passed, which they will point out to us. Ryltar says we should look for the tallest cairns, since those will be from people who had the most skills before they joined the Touched.

In the first cairn:

The second: a clanging basket, full of:

The third: an ancient wicket basket, which Salris takes one damage from opening

The fourth:

With the wand, Ryltar now casts Detect Magic, and we wander around looking for magical items. We find:

We still need to find some magic chalk for Ryltar to cast Teleportation Circle.

Next Session

The Party is captured by the Yuan-Ti, unless you can escape. Review your items, your spells, your attunements, your AC, melee attacks and damages, spell saves and attacks.