Inspiration: More Minecraft

More Mining! More Crafting!
Have I ever mentioned that the infamous Wizards of the Coast employee and expert Dungeon Master Chris Perkins worked in some Minecraft references to the free to download module Mines of Madness? It's one of my favorite adventures. I had a blast DMing it and watching when he ran it for the Acquisitions Incorporated team went through the module. You can download it for free at the DMsGuild website. He had a portal with monsters that resembled the creeper and such from Minecraft. He also had the dwarves using pickaxes like in Minecraft. It was nice the way the references was sprinkled throughout.

My Favorite Seed?
In anticipation of Minecraft version 1.12 releasing, I have been playing a game in version 1.11 and using the seed: -106396336

It spawns you near the X=0, Z=0 spot - which I always appreciate because I like making a "zero base" which serves as "Spawn City" or "Central City." A nice-size village is at the spawn area, in a plains biome with jungle, swamp, mesa/desert all within eyesight. An extreme hills area is pretty close by as well. It's got a ton of horses, cows, sheeps, chickens, and pigs all available in the vicinity as well as the major plants for farming. The nearby Mesa has an exposed pregenerated mine with a cave spider spawner. One of the Mesa caves has a spider spawner at Y=77. I just hope the new update keeps the seed mostly the same.

Inspiration: The Blacklist

Mystery Time!
Since I'm doing a series of blogs about inspiration for Dungeons & Dragons, I figure I had might as well discuss one of my current favorite TV shows: The Blacklist. I'm a sucker for anything with James Spader in it, but the show's mysteries also captured my attention. I just hate waiting week after week to find out the next clue or reveal.

The Reddit group for The Blacklist uses a graphic that asks "Who's your daddy?" because the main mystery of the show relies on the possibility of the Raymond Reddington character being Liz's father.

Each season contains episodes that seem like one-offs, but actually tie-in to a greater plot that usually goes into a big bad type of enemy for the season (or half-season) much like a D&D campaign would have one-off adventures with clues that might tie-in for a plot conducted by a big bad enemy.

I think you could have a campaign in which one of the characters builds into his or her background a mysterious parent (or simply unknown origins - lots of people like to play orphan characters). When one of my players did this type of background long ago, I had a ton of fun revealing the mysterious parentage/mother of the character and it led to great roleplaying. Just be careful that you work out something that the player will be happy with because you don't want to take away from the enjoyment the person had making the background in the first place.

I could discuss this show for hours with my theories about the mysteries involved (and sometimes I do, in the online forums with other fans), but this doesn't seem like the place for that.

Inspiration: WWE

Wrestling in D&D?
I noticed that Mike Mearls, the man in charge of Dungeons & Dragons for Wizards of the Coast, recently Tweeted about WWE:

(LOL, it's only $9.99 a month, as the WWE constantly points out.)

Some obvious inspirations exist for taking WWE "sports entertainment" wrestling characters and converting them to D&D. Obviously, DMs want to make sure they understand the rules for grappling, tripping, restraining, throwing people, etc. before encouraging this type of play - but it could be really exciting to have players rely less on weapons and more on physical combat moves.

Here are some potential character inspirations:
Hulk Hogan = Hul Cogan the human barbarian beach dude
Ultimate Warrior = an unnamed barbarian who almost always wins his battles
The Macho Man = Savage Randy the human fighter with winged boots, swoops down
The Undertaker = a sentient undead goliath warrior who keeps getting up in battle
Sting = a human monk or paladin called "The Scorpion" with a staff, avenging wrongs
"The Nature Boy" Rick Flair = Flick Rair the human ranger or druid
The NWO = a group of outsiders tries to take over the world, one faction at a time
Brock Lesnar = a half-orc named Bork who refuses to use weapons
John Cena = a human warlock who turns invisible and misty steps a lot to get surprise
Randy Orton = a yuan-ti rogue with "snake attack sneak attack"
Bray Wyatt = a human cult leader with no real power, but strong minions

I could keep going, but you get the idea. WWE relies on storytelling and combat so it actually comes close to the 3 pillars for D&D 5E (exploration, social interaction, and combat).

Inspiration: Star Trek Crews

Crews
Could we make some D&D 5E teams that use the Star Trek crews for inspiration? Here are some fun thoughts for some D&D 5E rival adventure teams that could be modeled after Star Trek crews and thrown into your adventures to compete with your D&D parties. Your players might never realize what you've done...

The Original Series
Kirk = Krik the human multiclass rogue-fighter
Spock = P'kos the half-elf monk
Dr. McCoy = Bones the human cleric
Scotty = Tocky the gnome sorcerer-smith
Sulu = Luus the human swordfighter
Uhura = Ruhra the human bard
Checkov = Chovek the halfling wizard

The Next Generation
Picard = Carpid the human bard
Riker = Kirer the human ranger
Dr. Crusher = Rush the human cleric
Wesley = Slewey the halfling rogue
Troi = Otri the half-elf psionicist
Data = Atad the warforged wizard
Worf = Frow the half-orc barbarian
LaForge = The Forger the human sorcerer-smith
Guinan = Nangui the elf monk

Deep Space Nine
Sisko = Kosis the human paladin
Kira = Arki the halfling fighter
Dax = X'da the elf monk
Dr. Bashir = Irbash the gnome cleric
O'Brien = Renibo the half-elf wizard-smith
Odo = Ood the human druid
Quark = R'quak the goblin rogue
Garak = Rakag the lizardfolk bard

Voyager
Janeway = Wajneway the human bard
Chakotay = Katachay the human monk
Tuvok = Votuk the drow fighter
The EMH Doctor = Hem the human cleric
B'Elanna = Nabelna the half-orc sorcerer
Paris = Raspi the halfling rogue
Harry = Ryrah the gnome wizard

I'm not going to bother with Enterprise. Sorry. It was a fun show, but not as good as the others. Besides, I wouldn't want to encourage that much time travel in a D&D game. :)

Inspiration: Star Trek

Boldly Going!
The best inspiration sometimes comes from an unexpected source. I think Star Trek, despite being science-fiction and not fantasy, provides a great amount of inspiration that Dungeon Masters could use for their D&D 5E games. DMs could approach the game like the writers of a TV show. You've got a collection of characters who team up and go on "away missions" for exploration. It fits with the 3 main pillars explained in D&D 5E (exploration, social interaction, and combat).

I sometimes make direct comparisons, though you don't have to. The Vulcans are space elves. The Romulans are the dark elves. The Klingons are like space orcs. The Ferengi could be greedy halflings or goblins. The Cardassians are lizardfolk. The Betazoids have limited psionic powers. There's really a lot to play with even doing a literal conversion.

Years ago I actually setup a series of D&D adventures called "Sea Trek" in which I was hoping to use the Star Trek episodic nature as an inspiration for a sea-ship crew to go on adventures exploring islands and accepting privateer-type of jobs hauling cargo and solving problems. The characters only stayed at sea for so long though, because their goals didn't align with staying on the ship. Of course, I kept NPCs sailing around the world and reporting back in every so often. The problem was that I introduced the concept mid-campaign. I think a campaign could be planned from the beginning to consist of a "Sea Trek" series of adventures.

You could also do a Spelljammer type of setting with actual starships interacting in space as well as engaging in away missions. My current group had that going on with their Tortuga ship, until it was too damaged and put in for repairs.

For my next blog, I think I will explore possible character conversions for Star Trek inspired teams...

T-Shirt: Cthulhu

There are a lot of great Cthulhu t-shirts out there. I don't own any yet, but I'm thinking about getting one of these shirts in the near future. You can easily search for them online:

The Batman-Cthulhu shirt is probably my favorite.

The greatest of all evils?

T-Shirt: Yin-Yang Dice

I also really like the Yin-Yang dice shirt:

Do the dice bring you peace?

T-Shirt: Carpe DM

Lately I've been wearing my dark blue "Carpe DM" shirt when we game so I thought I would give a shout out for it:

You can do a search online for the carpe DM shirt. I also pulled up these versions of the shirt when I looked at Amazon.com tonight. I kind of wish I had gotten the more colorful version:

Seize the Dungeon Master!

Thoughts: C Team Ep 7

Acquisitions Incorporated
Homebrew: C Team
Season 1: Episode 7
With Patrick Rothfuss gone, I feared the show might slip back into a lull, but I found myself pleasantly surprised when I watched and found that the players and DM seemed to have really found their groove and slipped into some fun roleplaying.

The new story arc picked up steam when the group was hired to go act as guards for a group of vampires. What was funny was that the audience watching the livestream had the option to vote on whether the "vampires" were really vampires or just LARPers pretending to be vampires; they ran out of time and thus the reveal should happen during next week's show.

I got to wondering about which character was my favorite. In the first episode, I only knew the drow K'thriss Drow'b and thus cared most about his character. Next up, I liked Rosie Beestinger the most because the player had a lot of fun bringing the halfling grandma concept to life. Recently though, I think I feel the most for the druid Walnut Dankgrass. The dragonborn Donaar Blit'zen is starting to also grow on me, but his character has been a bit of a royal snob and thus it's not easy to identify with him. Overall, Rosie has probably been my favorite but Walnut is coming in as a close second.

I think DM Jerry Holkins does his best when he doesn't reference his Acquisitions Incorporated character Omin Dran. I actually kind of wish they were just RPGing in the Forgotten Realms without any direct link to AI at this point, but I think they have done a nice job of becoming their own group at this point. I also like the mystery that the stars are aligned differently and thus they may be in an alternate reality (so that their storyline won't risk clashing with the main shows run by Chris Perkins at live events).

Table Talk
Jerry Holkins told the group that there was a secret vote that took place while they were playing. Oops. I don't think that's good DM strategy because obviously the players could see the stream or info about it on social media during the next week and it could ruin the surprise. But oh well. I suppose in the format they play, with the public sessions going on a weekly basis, those types of situations are unavoidable (unless they just don't do them).

I'm looking forward to next week's episode since the group stopped at a cliffhanger of a band saying they were going to play a song about Acquisitions Incorporated. I guess the DM has a week to get ready to sing for all of us... oh gosh, I hate waiting.

Thoughts: C Team Ep 6

Acquisitions Incorporated!
Homebrew: C Team 
Episode 6
Patrick Rothfuss breathed some much needed life into this show with his guest appearance for week 6. He played Dreibus (a half-orc), the son of Rosie Beestinger (the halfling monk) and not his usual Aquisitions Incorporated character Viari (the human bard from the main group).

(They really should add Driebus to the character list here)

The players enjoyed roleplaying back and forth so much this time that DM Jerry Holkins made a comment that they didn't even need him; I found that particularly funny since I have been critical with his DMing, though his DMing for this group is significantly improving.

Honestly I enjoyed the banter back and forth and player shenanigans so much this time that the Doomgate Inn storylines took a backseat for my interests. I was more concerned about the safety of the characters than what their actual goals were for this new arc, but I view that as a good sign. Even the dragonborn character, which had been pretty quiet for the first few episodes, was getting in more witty comments and clearly having a good time.

I liked that the episode seemed particularly "TV show episodic" in the sense that they started and ended in a way that allowed Driebus to join and then potentially leave at the end. It's nice when the RPG shows don't constantly end in dungeons or in the middle of things, leaving the fans/audience waiting from week to week to find out what happens next. BTW, I'm still not entirely sure what the Doomgate Inn plotline is going to be about - but that's ok.

(They really should add Driebus to the character list here too)

Table Talk
The post-game discussion was especially fun with Patrick Rothfuss dominating the conversation. Unfortunately, they made it clear that he only did this episode because he just happened to be in town for another event; they emphasized that his presence would not be a regular addition to the show. That's really too bad, but this episode did reignite my enthusiasm for watching the C Team.

Thoughts: C Team Ep 5

Acquisitions Incorporated!
C Team
When I previously wrote about the AI C Team playing D&D 5E, they had aired 4 episodes. Each Thursday they come out with another one and I decided to actively watch them each week as these episodes come out. They also started doing a 20-30 minute "Table Talk" after the 2.5 hour gaming sessions (starting with Episode 3).

Episodes 4 and 5 were a 2-part arc called "Dungeons and Wagons," which was much better than the first 3 episodes. The characters were involved in a wagon-oriented storyline; I could empathize with this situation because I usually play characters who want to establish a group wagon with horses or donkeys to help carry the group's equipment and transport them from place to place. Unfortunately, there were still some awkward moments; I could especially see some unpleasant facial expressions on the part of Falcone, who plays the druid character.

Even though the story improved, I worried that the series might be faltering. It didn't feel as funny as I expected the series to be.

I enjoy the "Table Talk" segments because we get to hear the players comment on what they liked about each gaming session. This gives them even more of a chance to laugh with each other. I think it also helps to explain why the characters make the decisions they do. Jerry Holkins, the DM, has started to come across better in the segments.

The good news is that I've already watched the next 2 episodes and they are amazing. Check out my thoughts about them in my next 2 blog posts...

SAGA Log 1438 The Thousand Fangs Below

The RPG SAGA continues...
DM Note:
I felt like the session this week stood out as one of our best, most exciting and emotionally-tense of all time. The modifications I made to the adventure path complicated events, but I saw a chance to run an adventure concept that I have wanted to do for a long time...

Session 1438
[Module: Serpent's Skull Adventure Path - Modified]
Pylia (half-elf bladesinger/wizard), Blue (satyr paladin), Drizmar (drow rogue), and Blood (satyr cleric reincarnated as a gnome) discussed their options after their rest from last time. Blood said she was concerned that something was wrong with reality because Pylia shouldn't have had the scrolls that were used to teleport them around on the previous day and they shouldn't have healed without getting snake scales all over their bodies. At that point they heard a horse galloping, running toward the room...

A spirit that looked like a handsome shirtless Strahd, on horseback, came through the wall and spoke to Pylia - asking if she was dead, saying he loved Pylia, and asking her to escape to go restore his humanity to him. Pylia thought on this, rejected the reality they were in, and disappeared (as did Strahd). Blue, Drizmar, and Blood discussed the situation for about half a minute before also rejecting this reality.

What they didn't know was that, when they went into the "Vault of Slumber" [during the last session], they were all captured by a wizard mindflayer and his grell minions [and he had put them through a dream-like sequence to test them and see how they would assault his lair to steal the crystal skulls]; he had used his mind domination to keep them all in a trance for days while using magic to create a simulacrum copy of each of them, then enhancing the simulacra in Illithid-brine pools. The simulacra of Pylia, Blue, Drizmar, and Blood woke up not knowing they were simulacra. A voice in their heads wouldn't allow them to attack the mindflayer (whom Pylia nicknamed "Chuck" and Blue called "Cthulhu"). "Cthulhu-Chuck" sent them to assault the nearby yuan-ti lair, retrieve the human prisoner being held by them, and find out whatever info he had. Chuck was up front about his goal to use the yuan-ti's snake god's body as a host for the primordial "Child of Tharizdun" that he served.

With permission, they went past the minions (the maze spiders and the intellect devourers). They rescued the half-dragon/serpent (nicknamed "Snek") and proceeded to the yuan-ti lair (with fake crystal skulls). They convinced the guards to let them in and tried bluffing that they had the crystal skulls; the enemies agreed to exchange the prisoner (Eando) for the skulls. Once the team had Eando, they ran; the yuan-ti army was quickly behind them (having easily figured out the deception once they had the fake skulls).

The team (still unaware they were merely simulacra and not themselves) got Eando to tell them where the godslayer sword was located (since he was weak and they knew he was about to die in the battle). The yuan-ti group included a powerful fighter commander, a wizard, a ghost sorcerer, a rogue, and 25 soldiers; they had left the succubus Selaxasp (with the iron golems and nagas) back at the fortress. In a close battle, before being wiped out, the team took out all of the enemies except for the ghost sorcerer and a few soldiers [in what would have been a TPK if they had not been simulacra]. Snek finished off the bad guys.

Back at the home of "Cthulhu-Chuck," the team woke up with Grell's removing tentacles from their faces. Chuck confirmed what had happened and that he had used a mind-link that had allowed them to know the experiences of their simulacra. Blue was upset and demanded they immediately go rescue Snek. Chuck gave them access to chain shirts, short swords, and crossbows; they reunited with Snek.

Chuck was willing to help the group assault the yuan-ti holy cave to try to get their stolen gear back; he used his scrying orb to confirm the enemies at that cave (which included many undead, the undead froghemoth, a powerful yuan-ti necromancer, a hired assassin in bug armor, the sorcerers, and the priests). The team needed to decide what to prioritize: obtaining the godslayer sword (which Chuck refused to help with), performing the ritual(s) in the City of the 7 Statues (which Pylia wasn't too keen on), or assaulting the holy cave to kill the yuan-ti high priest (and get their gear).

They rested for an hour. Pylia used her meditation to commune with the Strahd spirit, sending him telepathic images of the Purple Rock islands; Strahd responded he would try to secretly send help. They decided to go try to get the godslayer sword in the secret caverns, with Snek joining them in their quest.

FOE Log 25

Federation of Explorers (FOE)
Homebrew Campaign in the Forgotten Realms

Session 25: Into the Fog...
Regnar (human ranger) reunited with Zen (half-elf monk), "Scorchin' Ray" Sunsoaker (human cleric), and the 2 dwarf fighter brothers (Tacklinn and Orsik Ungard); they updated each other about what happened since they split the party. The group returned to the Monastery of the 4 Elements, where Zen convinced the monks to dedicate 25% of their forces to help the dwarves fight the undead in the region. He also bought a Dao mask for Regnar, to hide Regnar's new undead appearance. The team spent 4 days studying the stat books Regnar had attained and another 2 days while traveling back to the dwarf mountain fortress (escorting the monks along the way). Orsik spent his time decoding the journals, books, maps, etc. with the plans of the Vecna cult.

FOE spoke with the king (leaving the decoded info with him), the druid lady, a powerful dwarf wizard (who traded gear), and a powerful cleric (who traded more with them); by selling the staff of fire, they were able to afford a lot of neat stuff (bracers of defense, staff of healing, a shield+2, prayer beads, etc.). The group then killed 10 undead while they spent 4 days traveling through the mountains to where the Vecna cult was doing their ritual. At the site, they KO'd one of the 4 chanting cultists - but the fog/mist of the Domains of Dread swept away the cultists, the group, and the crystal shards that were meant for Vecna (so he could become more powerful and escape from the Domains of Dread).

An "orb of light" came down and spoke to the guys in different ways: Raylin heard Pholtus saying to destroy the crystals Vecna wanted, Zen heard St. Cuthbert saying he could release them from the fog after they stopped Vecna's plans, and Regnar heard Vecna calling him an unexpected "5th" and asked him to get the crystals for him. The team took their prisoner through the corrupted forest in Vecna's domain, found a group of humans living in a cave, and spoke to the leader in his wooden home.

Vae, the leader of the cave dwellers, attacked Regnar due to a misunderstanding (since Regnar looked undead); the group won the battle by KOing him (but then they woke him back up). Regnar told everyone about Vecna's voice talking to him; Vecna told him to leave and the group decided it was a good idea to go (after the cultist insisted he knew nothing about the location of the crystals). They saw a tower in the distance that Vae had called "The Decaying Tower."

SAGA Log 1437 Silence & Slumber

The RPG Saga continues with...
DM's Note:
In the actual module that inspired these adventures, the characters end up at the City of 7 Spears and I changed it to the City of the 7 Statues; instead of locating 7 magical spears to put on statues, I have them finding 7 crystal skulls to place on headless statues. I had read criticism about the way the module was put together with city adventures followed by the vaults (which I agreed with) so I condensed stuff together. I also added some special properties to the vaults because I wanted it to be more fun/special for my players than just what would seem like a random dungeon crawl.

I give my players a lot of freedom to roam as they would like and go after the goals they desire, thus they rarely go from Point A to Point B to Point C as a module/adventure path would expect them to. This week's session showed them once again defying expectations (in a very fun way)...

Session 1437
[Module: Serpent's Skull Adventure Path - Modified]
Pylia (half-elf bladesinger/wizard), Blue (satyr paladin), Drizmar (drow rogue), and Blood (satyr cleric reincarnated as a gnome) were with the evoker and diviner sorcerers; the team put their hands on the handle to the Vault of Silence but realized the 2 sorcerers did not; thus Pylia, Blue, Drizmar, and Blood ended up getting magically sucked into the vault with all of their gear falling off and staying behind with the sorcerers in the Vault of Madness.

The naked team defeated 3 yuan-ti malisons by using broken glass and curtains; they looted scimitars and some clothing from the snakemen. The group avoided 2 large skeletal creatures, went through a magic mirror portal to tunnels that were no longer silent, and destroyed 4 specters. They made some gear from things in the caverns. They killed 12 flying eyeballs. They explored a secret passage that went to a cavern with a roper and a zombie beholder; they killed the roper and banished the beholder. The next passage took them to the magic door for the Vault of Slumber.

After the group touched the entrance to the Vault of Slumber, they ended up in a room with a large aberration that they avoided. A tunnel took them to a waterfall and magic pond with a strange pink-scaled sea serpent that the group befriended; the 8 4-armed mushroom creatures fled into the pond. The group avoided the spiders, intellect devourers, and mindflayer wizard; they went through a secret tunnel and negotiated with demon guards; Drizmar went in with greater invisibility to get the crystal skulls while the team used Pylia's magic for a telepathic link to help figure out the magic puzzles.

They lit the magic garden maze on fire and watched as their new half-dragon serpent friend killed the monsters; they left the serpent behind when Pylia (somehow) teleported the team to Drizmar, they got the skulls (the 7 actual crystal skulls and 3 fake ones), and Pylia (somehow) teleported them again to the ape king’s throne room, where they found Pezok hanging out with the ape king; they gave the ape king the coins they got inside and convinced the king to make a big to-do ceremony (with Blue's help) publicly putting the crystal skulls on the statues (though they put 4 real ones and the 3 fake ones there while Drizmar invisibly hid the other 3 real skulls). Blue sent Pezok to patrol the areas with the hidden skulls.

They rested for 8 hours in the throne room, even though the ape king offered them his finest guest quarters; they wanted to be there in case the evoker and diviner tried to escape the vault or the other 6 sorcerers showed up trying to get them out. The ape king's servants mentioned a city rumor that the jungle necromancer had been spotted in the city, but Pylia insisted on staying to watch the door to the Vault of Madness. She even suggested that, with everyone rested, they should go back inside the Vault of Madness to try to figure out a way to get their stuff back. Blue asked the ape king to bring them some new armor and weapons to borrow in the meantime.

FOE Log 24

Federation of Explorers (FOE)
Homebrew Campaign in the Forgotten Realms

Session 24: The Headless Horseman & Nightmare
With Zen, Raylin, Tacklinn, and Orsik off fighting at the necromancer's keep - Regnar (human ranger) and Tavin (human fighter) were waiting for the nightmare that Tavin had been contracted to slay...

(Above: Tavin, Slayer of Nightmares)

SIDEQUEST: Regnar and Tavin waited at the road; when they spotted the headless horseman fly by on the nightmare, they were blasted by a cone of cold; the enemies flew away. Hot on the trail, Regnar and Tavin flew down that path and destroyed some undead along the way (4 skeletons and 3 zombies); they also killed some Vecna cultists.

They found the cave their enemies were hiding in, but decided to take an hour’s rest before going inside. In the cave entrance, they fought the nightmare again, but he phased out after taking a lot of damage. Continuing through the cave, Regnar and Tavin took damage from magic traps, went down stairs, and killed 4 more cultists (who had a bunch of pink potions, research, and some magic books that Regnar put in the bag of holding).

(Above: "The Headless Horseman" Oni)

In the deeper tunnel, Regnar and Tavin destroyed 3 more zombies and a ghost before finding and defeating the headless horseman (who turned out to be an oni and claimed to be a “Chosen of Vecna” who operated as a messenger for his evil god) and the nightmare; during the battle, to keep Regnar from dying, Tavin poured one of the pink potions down Regnar’s throat [which made the ranger appear to turn undead – except for his arm with the Malar symbol – and brought Regnar back to full health to finish the battle]. Tavin almost died in battle [but rolled a natural 20 death save] before they finished off the oni.

In the end, they collected the treasure and decided to swap out items so that Tavin got Regnar’s cloak of the bat and Regnar got Tavin’s winged boots. Tavin went off to report that the nightmare was killed while Regnar stayed at the road to wait for his adventuring group to return from the necromancer’s lair.

FOE Log 23: Flashback 3

Before the Federation of Explorers (FOE) existed...

Homebrew Campaign in the Forgotten Realms

Flashback 3 of 3

[A year ago, during April and May, AMC DM’d me and NH through a fun series of adventures in the same world as the current FOE adventures…]

The group used the secret passage to get to the roof, where they saw towers with balistas and big bolts – with Neverwinter below. Tahlwyn completed the ritual, turning 2 of the commoners into gold dragons; Bahamut appeared (for a moment). The dragons dropped the group off at the towers to use the balistas (and left, flying to fight the incoming shadow dragon leader).

Clover and Tahlwyn were on 2 different towers and each had to kill the ballista guards. They used the weapons to help the 2 gold dragons fight the shadow dragon. Clover called upon his god Kozah and took down the shadow dragon with a blast of divine lightning that also propelled himself into the shadow dragon; Clover and the shadow dragon crashed into the flying castle, where Clover tumbled and discovered a death slaad; the team came to help and Koseph died in combat before the death slaad was slain.

Trying to escape, Clover and Tahlwyn ended up falling through the sky and onto an enemy flying ship, where they intimidated 5 of the bad guys into either fleeing or helping. Below deck were 9 more enemies running the cannons; after they defeated the leader, Clover and Tahlwyn took command of the others and ordered them to fire on the other enemy airships.

Their captured ship became a target and they had to flee, jumping from airship to airship as it was being destroyed. On the next ship, they defeated another boss and made the 4 workers again turn the cannons on the other airships.

After surviving that action, Clover healed Sharina and the team helped the rebels break into the city to defeat the evil enemy army. They were invited to the rebel leadership meeting with 1 copper dragonborn, 1 gold half-dragon, and a human. They declared Clover, Tahlwyn, and Sharina heroes and gave them each a reward of a noble estate; they also insisted that this was only 1 battle of a larger war.

Clover planned to hire someone to run his noble estate so he could leave for more adventures and see what else he could do to help with the war and free the Sword Coast from the forces of the dragon army.

Reflections:

As a player, this might have been the most fun I've ever had in an adventure session. We used a lot of creativity with the battle in the sky and it was super exciting jumping from airship to airship as each one was destroyed. It was one of those epic moments in gaming that is really hard to reproduce and it was truly shocking that our characters survived.

FOE Log 22: Flashback 2

Before the Federation of Explorers (FOE) existed...

Homebrew Campaign in the Forgotten Realms

Flashback 2 of 3

[A year ago, during April and May, AMC DM’d me and NH through a fun series of adventures in the same world as the current FOE adventures…]

(Above: Tahlwyn, half-elf wizard)

Clover, Tahlwyn, Koseph, Sharina, Silverscale, and the 4 commoners met the new guy Baldlin (a human sage/sorcerer) after going through a secret door/passage. Baldlin volunteered info as an inside guy/spy and to watch over the commoners in his office inside the flying castle (lair of evil).

The group explored and, at location 1, ended up battling and defeating 1 blue dragonborn priest, 2 black dragonborn guards, and a grick. Clover destroyed a dragon statue and they found an artifact piece. At location 2, they killed 1 human noble, 1 dragonborn sage, 2 dragonborn nobles, 1 red dragonborn knight, and 3 black dragonborn guards.

They returned to Baldlin’s office, defeated a specter, and got the third Tiamat artifact. They went to the temple room for the fourth artifact, where they had to kill 4 dragonborn guards (3 green, 1 red), 1 red kobold on a hellhound, and Baldlin (who was the “judge” working for the shadow dragon).

Back in the secret passage to rest, Tahlwyn had a vision of how to put together the artifacts to turn 2 people into gold dragons.

FOE Log 21: Flashback 1

Before the Federation of Explorers (FOE) existed...

Homebrew Campaign

Flashback 1 of 3

[A year ago, during April and May, AMC DM’d me and NH through a fun series of adventures in the same world as the current FOE adventures…]

Background:

In this version of the Forgotten Realms world of Toril, the Sword Coast was conquered by a shadow dragon and army serving Tiamat.

(Above: Clover Downer)

Clover Downer (the human cleric of “Kozah the Storm Lord” a.k.a. Talos) went with a caravan and the group was attacked by an army of dragonborn. He woke up in a dungeon cell with Tahlwyn Rymah (half-elf wizard) as prisoners inside of a floating castle above Neverwinter (after it had been taken over by the dragon army). They rescued Koseph the human pirate, who was looking for his lost love; the group killed 4 green dragonborn, 2 black dragonborn in the next room, 6 more guards (1 red, 3 black, and 2 green dragonborn) in the hall, and an evil priest (white dragonborn) downstairs.

The team rescued 4 people (3 humans and 1 elf), then rescued 1 silver dragonborn “Silverscale” with Sharina the gold dragonborn in the next room. They also killed 1 black dragonborn noble and 1 white dragonborn priest. Clover and Tahlwyn rested while Silverscale guarded the 4 commoners.

The team learned that 4 artifacts could end or secure the reign of the shadow dragon. For loot, the group received black platemail and a magic shortsword (which they used to get one of the 4 Tiamat aftifacts).

Side Note: 

Clover worshipped "Kozah" but did not realize that this was just another name for Talos, who is usually considered an evil diety; the Kozah legends painted Talos as a more heroic figure; during battle, Clover would often yell out "Kozah!" He never learned the truth about his god.