A New Campaign; or, By This Axe I Rule!
This session was played on Tuesday, July 9, 2013.
Note: For the immediate future we are switching to race-as-class
It included:
Garath, Level 1 Fighter and his Man-Arms Larus
Brother Maynard, Level 1 Cleric
Yorrick, Level 1 Elf and his Man-at-Arms Garis
Grundel, Level 1 Fighter and his Torch-Bearer J.B. (Jerked Beef)
A band of brave adventurers set out from the village of Helix on a quest to plunder the cavernous ruins of an ancient civilization. Among this lot are the humble cleric Brother Maynard, the tough yet clumsy warrior Grundel and two elves Garath, and Yorrick. After a hard march this intrepid band reached a massive canyon littered with caves and signs of of a long forgotten people. Broken pillars and ruins dot the landscape as the adventurers march towards the closest cave entrance.
The party cautiously enters the cave, all is quiet aside from the occasional dripping sound of water.
At the rear of the cavern the party find signs of an old campfire, a large puddle of water and signs of large webbed feet in the sand.
Finding nothing of value, they proceed to the next cave. With several paths before them in the first cavernous room, they proceed forward to investigate but are taken by surprise by two giant toads. During this battle, Grundel is nearly devoured by one toad and hacks his way through its innards with his trusty axe. He raised his ichor-drenched weapon above his head and exclaimed, "By this axe, I rule!"
Emboldened by their first victory over the savage wildlife, they proceed onward and discover a corpse face down in the mud. Upon further investigation (prodding it with a stick) several Rot Grubs wriggle out of the corpse and are quickly dispatched by blade and fire.
The corpse they found had been dead for a couple weeks at least, but what ever killed him wasn't interested in the 91 gold coins he had in his purse. The party collected their first taste of treasure and continued onward into two large rooms.
The second of these rooms seamed to be a good place to hide something, so the group decided to spread out and give this room a thorough search.
The search was interrupted as Grundel heard hissing noises coming from down the hall. The party quickly formed ranks and prepared themselves for battle as a giant lizard strode towards them licking its lips with hunger. As the creature approached Grundel gave a mighty swing of his battle axe and crushed the creatures skull in one blow. Following the tracks of this lizard lead them to its nest where they found 93 silver coins mixed in with the bones of the creature's previous meal.
In the next room, the adventurers where assailed by 3 giant weasels. They closed ranks around the entrance of the room and fought valiantly. Yorick scored a mighty blow with a dart but these dexterous creatures prove hard to hit.
Unfortunately one of these savage weasels bit into the throat of hireling Garis and killed him outright. With Garis out of the way, one of the weasels tore into hireling Larus and left him clutching tenaciously to life. Yorick focused on the most injured weasel - and in a move reminiscent of the "Kreel Maneuovre" - reached his spear passed the closest weasel in what is now known as "Yorick's Reach Around."
The next casualty was the mighty Grundel who was knocked unconscious by a vicious blow to the head after killing one of the foul beasts.
Brother Maynard bravely enters the fray, swinging his weapon mightily and protecting his fallen comrades. However he is knocked down by one of the weasels and now the party is in danger of being completely overrun. Yorick and Garath consider fleeing, but it's obvious that they cannot outrun these beasts so they fight on to their last breath. Thankfully they managed to finish off the remaining two weasels in the next round of combat with the help of Grundel who came to his senses and rejoined the battle.
The party rested a moment and bandaged their wounds, however the smell of blood had attracted more large rodents to the area. A pack of giant rats began to move boldly towards the party as Grundel and Garath quickly tossed one of the weasel corpses at them to distract them.
Thankfully the rats took the bait and where distracted long enough for the party to toss flasks of oil into their midst and set the pack on fire.
Yorick, recalling tales of poachers from his homeland, identified the weasel pelts as being quite valuable. The party skinned the two remaining weasels and headed back to town to collect a rather hefty sum of 1600 gold pieces for the two hides. All in all it was a rather dangerous expedition, but the rewards greatly outweighed the risks.
