CoMT 9: The Green Tide

The Adventures of the Criminals of Many Things (the evolution of the FOE2 Team) continue with:
Seiken the elf kensei monk,
Mory Brewblood the dwarf cleric,
Elyrin the human necromancer, and
Bleaksin Blackscale the kobold scout!

CoMT Session 9
Homebrew FR Campaign: The City of Many Things
Continuing from last time, locking themselves in the wizard's tower: Mory, Seiken, Elyrin, and Bleaksin found themselves surrounded by "The Green Tide" army of orcs and goblins. There were well over 100 enemies surrounding the tower while the team tried to figure out what to do. When Mory looked out the window, the goblin archers hit him with enough arrows to knock him unconscious. The rest of the team plugged up the window.

Seiken and Bleaksin looked through all of the magic supplies and messed around in the potion lab to figure out how to make some magic explosives. Elyrin read through the necromancer's books to figure out how to use the portals; he discovered a portal that went to the old Karse lich trapped in the city's central tower. Mory discovered a ritual to make a pact with Sothragot, an agent of Tharizdun, via the astrolab,

The team prepared 8 bags of wild magic bombs and, once night came, opened up the ceiling to use the astrolab. Seiken, Bleaksin, and Elyrin held back the army of orcs and goblins for 10 rounds while Mory did the ritual to commune with Sothragot. Sothragot demanded Mory's eternal servitude, but destroyed all of the orcs and goblins in the City of Many Things! The orcs and goblins disintegrated around the team.

4U 12: Magma Dragons

The RPG SAGA continues in the 4th Universe with "The Dream Team" of:
Koriel "Kori" the aasimar (human-looking) arcane archer,
"Puff" the gnome dream druid,
Aegle the winged elf kensei monk,
and their allies...

DM Note
Before the session started, I made sure to tell the players that I have been enjoying the campaign and they hadn't done anything to upset me; I wasn't trying to punish them or purposely kill off their characters, but I wanted them to know they had wandered into a deadly area on their own and it might not go well for the party. As always, they impressed me with their strategy as they miraculously escaped a TPK.

4U Session 12 Log
Homebrew Campaign (Alternate Forgotten Realms)
[Modules: Modified -----]
The team (Kori, Puff, Aegle, Frazzle, Acidfire, the 3 kobold allies, the 2 leatherworkers, and the captured modron) teleported into the lava level beneath Obsidian Fang - with most of them falling into the lava. Only Kori and Puff had land to stand on; Aegle was able to fly and temporarily save a kobold and one of the leather workers - but in the end only Kori, Puff, and Aegle lived through the encounter because there were 2 magma dragons and 2 fire elementals that attacked them.

After killing the monsters, the survivors found themselves overheated by the environment and realized they needed to escape. They took the dead dragon heads and claws with them. They also recovered the obsidian scythe (assuming that Mel was dead) and used it as their portal key to get back up to the celler level.

Thanks to Puff's dream druid abilities, they were able to hide and rest in the swamp before making it to the mountains. Puff's jade crown taught him the ritual to replace his eyes with the fire-emeralds from the magma dragons. After Puff got his new magic vision, the team decided to head north, along the edge of the mountains and up the Delimbyr river in hopes that they could trade magic items at Elvenport. They safely made their way there, where they were greeted by friendly elves, half-elves, and eladrin citizens of a walled elven city with a beautiful palace.

First they traded out gear and handed over their displacer beast and dragon body parts to magic-smiths to make them new items; the elves said it would take a year to make everything they wanted. The team visited with the eladrin prince leader of the city; the prince liked them and told them they could live in the palace for the year. Aegle even got the prince to agree to provide art supplies so he could start working on making paintings detailing the stories of his adventures.

4U 11: Obsidian Portal

The RPG SAGA continues in the 4th Universe with "The Dream Team" of:
Koriel "Kori" the aasimar (human-looking) arcane archer,
"Puff" the gnome dream druid,
Aegle the winged elf kensei monk,
and their allies...

DM Note
Providing an open campaign with options for the players to go wherever they want can lead to funny moments. This time, the players (both in character and out) discussed their options for quite a while before doing anything. As a DM I was ready. Go left? Sure. Right? Sure. Back? Ok. Downtime? Great! Ultimately, they decided to go back, because treasure...

4U Session 11 Log
Homebrew Campaign (Alternate Forgotten Realms)
[Modules: Modified -----]
With a nice rest, the group was all back together again with their kobold recruits and leather workers (cutting up the dead dragon body); the team discussed what to do and where to go next. Some of them wanted to return to the Bayou Brigade fort, some of them considered returning to Tholmme, and some wanted to go back to the shattered Obsidian Fang. They went back and forth debating whether or not to take downtime, but they ultimately chose to seek out treasure at the Obsidian Fang.

Puff noticed lots of snakes in the swamp now; he used "speak with animals" to find out the snakes had been oppressed before and were now happily retaking control of the area. The team had first traveled part of the way to the fort, but Aegle's scouting revealed some yuan-ti doing a ritual and snake banners at the fort now; that was why they headed back to Obsidian Fang.

In exploring the levels of Obsidian Fang, the team defeated: a minotaur, a clay golem, a mud mephitic, a cockatrice, and 2 displacer beasts; an evocation wizard escaped via a purple-swirly magic portal. The team also found a nice amount of treasure - including a captured modron that was able to communicate with Kori. Some of the treasure auto-attuned and may have been cursed - including a dagger that made Puff try to stab himself through the heart.

The team gave Mel (the former lycan) some of the best gear and he went through the portal first (to scout); the portal required a magic portal key; when Mel never returned, the rest of the team figured out the cursed dagger was also a key and Puff ended up stabbing himself as he tried to use it; Puff survived and the team (Kori, Puff, Aegle, Frazzle, Acidfire, the 3 kobolds, the 2 leather workers, and the captured modron) went into the portal...

Sidenote: There were also some antics with carrying around the mundane chest that seemed to be a "Chest of Holding."

CoMT 8: The Old Gods

The Adventures of the Criminals of Many Things (the evolution of the FOE2 Team) continue with:
Seiken the elf kensei monk,
Mory Brewblood the dwarf cleric,
Elyrin the human necromancer, and
Bleaksin Blackscale the kobold scout!

CoMT Session 8
Homebrew FR Campaign: The City of Many Things
Still at the wizard's tower: Mory, Seiken, Elyrin, and Bleaksin ascended the stairs - up to level five; they found teleportation circles in a wizard's lab. The group heard a voice from up above; the evil necromancer who had taken over the tower was in the astrolab. The group had to defeat him, his mind-controlled ghost, and 5 zombies. After that, they took a good rest.

Uninterrupted, the team was able to spend two days reading/studying. Mory learned about "The Old Gods" from books in the tower; this lead to him gaining an obsession with Tharizdun. They also learned about the ancient Karse rich trapped in the City of Many Things central tower.

Wanting to kill more orcs, the team went out. In the streets, they defeated 3 orcs and 6 goblins before advancing on the orc keep (where Seiken and others had previously escaped up from the sewers). There, the team took down 3 orcs/orgos, 6 goblins, and 2 trolls before strategically retreating. They heard war cries as more orcs/goblins swarmed out. The team made it back to the tower.