Princes of the Apocalypse: Session 3 Part I

[DISCLAIMER: This post contains spoilers for Princes of the Apocalypse.]

Elven horns sounded in the distance as Reed Tosscobble, halfling swashbuckler, lies on his back. The bolt from his hand crossbow still quivers in the doorframe, the hulking Orc brute in the doorway snarls at him and then turns, fleeing the burning building into the night.

Our party are:

David Maltman as Reed Tosscobble, Halfling Rogues Swashbuckler

David Longbottom as Ulfang Strackhelm, Dwarf Cleric of Helm

Amanda Hewitt as Eva Dawnfell, Human Monk Necromancer

Dak’kon of the unbroken circle of Zerthimon, a Githzerai and NPC Companion.

We return to the Dessarin Valley and the ruins of the Delamon Ranch which was still aflame. By the flickering of the light the party are greeted by the Cavalry of High Forest who were summoned at the request of the Emerald Enclave following a message from Dreena, the Druid who earned much of Eva’s scorn, and some of her grudging respect.

The survivors were taken by cart back to Beliard. Kelbrin Delamon lost his eldest son Perd and his home in a single night. Perd’s wife, who had been the archer on the top floor of the farmhouse, cradled their two children and huddled them all the way back to The Watchful Knight.

The people of Beliard turned out to be a generous sort, rallying round to feed and water the refugees and the party, who gave some coin to Kelbrin with the instruction to spend it to help the people displaced by the Orc attacks.

The party then met Gurt Prongfellow, a young man and Innkeeper of the Watchful Knight, a role he inherited after his father, Tor Prongfellow, went missing on the same night as The Watchful Knight, an inert suit of once animated armour, sprang to life and escaped the inn.

He also had a business proposition for the party, giving them the top 3 floors of an old tower which is part of the somewhat sprawling Watchful Knight, and was currently only being used for salvage. The bottom floor however had become home to Tatiana Vranks, the acolyte of the party had met with, who had decided to found a Temple of Chauntea here.

The party agree to 100gp rent a month and in gratitude Tatiana gives Ulfang a small ivory goat statuette that is magical in nature and grows into a stony goat-like mount he can use to get around.

The party plans then next move and elects to head south, escorting Erned Stoutfellow back to Summit Hall where he is greeted by his mistress, Ushien Stormbanner, head of the Knights of Samular, who chastises him for running off on his own. She then promotes Ulfang to the rank of Marcheon and inducts Reed Tosscobble into the order as a Chevall, which amazingly, is not a horse.

The party from here had four options of how to proceed: Rivergard Keep they had visited, as well as the Sacred Stone Monastery which they had barely escaped alive and had, according to Ushien, been mostly abandoned. Dreena back at Delamon Ranch had mentioned before their leaving a gathering of Druids at Scarlet Moon Hall but Ushien asked the party to let her scout the area before they approached it.

[DM’s Notes: My party decided, in a fit of metagaming, that this was probably due to it being to difficult, which of course was silly, for reasons that will become obvious in Part II.]

They decided instead to take up the invitation of Ser Thurl Merroska, who knew Tosscobble’s alias back in Waterdeep and had given members of means in the Waterdhavian court an open invitation to join him at Feathergale Spire.

The party journeyed south, coming afoul of Gnolls on the road from Summit Hall to Womford before heading west towards Red Larch. At the end of their first day of travel they were setting camp when they heard the sounds of fighting coming from a clearing in a forest by the side of the road.

There they found dwarves in the distinctive yellow helms of Ghaelub Pwent’s miners fighting a pair of Gargoyles. The party lunged into the fray, spells blazing and swords singing as they beat away at their stoney foes. Reed attacked one from the shadows which turned and attacked him. In a deft maneuver Reed ran over the top of the Gargoyle and ducked behind one of the dwarves, only for the Gargoyle to tear the young miner apart with its teeth and claws.

When the battle was done the Dwarves mourned their compatriot Bern and the party made camp with them, whilst Reed stood away from the others, visibly shaken, looking at the sigil of the Sacred Stone Monastery etched into the gargoyles foreheads. In the pale light of morning, with the body bound and dressed by Eva, Jorgen said a few words and Gorg wept openly for his brother, then the party raised the young Dwarf on a litter and set out west for Red Larch.

Mellikho’s Stoneworks had been taken over by Pwent at the party’s suggestion and the Dwarves made a camp in the old quarry. The town was bustling with the Dwarven trade and the only interruption to their business came with the arrival of the party. Suddenly there was a funeral to prepare, a Dwarven lay preacher to find, a rite to Moradin in the Temple of All Faiths and a final rest in a grave in the quarry.

Bern was to be an apprentice to Pwent, he never arrived.

The party drank respectfully and solemnly at the wake, then retired to their rooms. Reed did not sleep, haunted by his actions. So too was Ulfang, around his kinsmen he was reminded all too keenly of his own family in Citadel Felspar, and roused by the sound of mattocks already at work in the quarry, he resolved to leave as early as possible.

[DMs notes: This is what happens when you roll 2 random encounters back to back and we got a lot of mileage out of it. Sometimes things like this line up for a DM and I was lucky to have two encounters that both fed back into the actions the characters had taken. The Gargoyles are obviously an Earth Cult encounter so it was a no brainer to try and tie them back to the party escaping the Sacred Stone Monastery.

However with the Dwarves involved in the combat I got to mix up the conditions of success and failure by having the Gargoyles kill the Dwarves. The party got to be heroic, charging to the rescue, but the moment Reed decided to use one as cover I knew I was going to punish him.

The death became a cool opportunity for the character’s to engage for a moment in the society in which they live. I didn’t linger on these scenes, flitting through a montage of the mourning, the funeral, the wake, the morning after, but in this we learned more of Ulfang’s back story, we saw Reed awake in his room, haunted by his actions, we saw Eva dressing the body and burning a scroll in solitude to her god Jergal, to see the young Dwarf was not found to be ‘in deficit’.

I learned something new about all of these characters in how they reacted to this randomly rolled NPC who appeared from nowhere and who disappeared into a grave in the quarry he was destined to never reach.

As a GM you can make these moments happen, but they only work when the players are on board and I consider myself fortunate to have such a good party.]

In the cold light of day Gorg tries to tell himself this is just the way it is. He is red faced, unsteady on his feet. The strong ale and wine and whisky and the drink that came after have reddened his cheeks, but the warmth of them has left him. He holds a hot marble in his throat, looking around as he feels it grow, then convinced he is alone he lets a painful, wracked sound escape his throat and stumbles onto one knee.

In the shadow of a quarry tunnel Pwent feels an urge to rush to him, to console him, but he doesn’t know what to say. The words are just that, helplessness lines his boots like lead, and so he turns away and hefts his mattock towards the stone once again.

TO BE CONTINUED...