Lets Play: Princes of the Apocalypse (D&D 5E Adventure)

[Jeikor]

Are we still going to play?

[Rilbur]

Woops... meant to get this started and looks like I let it slip.

[Rilbur]

BTW, final chance if anyone wants to make any character adjustments.  Here's my proposed start -- if no one has any issues, we'll start tomorrow.

 

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The town of Red Larch, in the Dessarin Valley, has recently been rocked by a series off disasters, both natural and otherwise.  A long, prolonged drought has damaged their local agriculture, while a sudden upsurge in banditry has cut off the trade routes running through the town.  No one really seems to care too much, but several local churches pooled together to send a small relief effort to the area.  It wasn't a particularly important mission, so rather than dedicate one of their unfortunately rare clerics to the task of overseeing the caravan to its destination, they pooled together and hired the job out.

 

You and your companions hired on, each for your own reasons.  Perhaps you need coin, or perhaps you see the charitable act of escorting the wagon as worth doign in it's own right.  Whatever your purpose, your goal is in sight.  Your martial array has scared off the banditry, allowing you to travel without significant opposition, and Red Larch has come into view no more than a mile up the road.

 

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[Rilbur]

I'm also asking permission to slightly customize the background.  Since Zozo already gets Deception training from being a changeling, I would like to change the charlatan background skill to Persuasion instead.

 

I already gave this my blessing... but I want to revisit it.  I recently noticed a little tidbit in the book, and it turns out it's completely and totally adventure league legal to customize your background more or less completely.  Take one of the existing features, any two skills, and two of either tool proficiency or languages.

 

Feel free to avail yourselves of this at this point.

[Rilbur]

You'll note I've gone ahead and updated my character from a valor bard to a war cleric.  I think that'll be more helpful than yet another arcane caster.

[Rilbur]

BTW, Jeikor, as a note -- while a lot of people call Oath of Ancients paladins 'green knights', they aren't really 'druid paladins'.  To quote the book, they fight because they love the beautiful and life giving they see in the world.  While their is definitely a druidic bent to a lot of their spells, don't think of it as a paladin meets druid oath, flavor wise.  It's a more subtle bent.  Honestly, this confusion is wizard's fault because they kept edging up to that very obvious theme, then deliberately backing away from it.

 

Anyway, since I don't think we've covered it, as an Oath of the Ancients paladin, you'll be required to follow the following tenants:

• Kindle the Light:  Through your own actions, kindle the light of hope in the world
• Shelter the Light:  Protect goodness, beauty, love, laughter, and life.
• Preserve Your Own Light: Delight in song, laughter, beauty, art.  If you let the light die in yourself, you can't do your job.
• Be the Light:  Be a beacon of light in the world.  Let the light of your joy and courage shine forth in all your deeds.

An oath of devotion paladin is one who stands firm against all evil.  An Oath of Vengeance paladin is one who does whatever he must to beat the darkness.  An Oath of Ancients paladin lives a life of song and beauty and valor.  Note that two of his tenants aren't about what he does, it's about who he lets it make of him.  If he isn't singing and laughing and dancing at night, he's done something wrong.

 

And to bring us back to why I posted all this: despite what I let Zerg slip in, none of this makes you an environmentalist -- unless there's something in your background that changes that.  The closest you get is a responsibility to protect life, or rather to protect the places where life flourishes against things that try to make the area barren.  "As a paladin who had taken the Oath of the Ancients" you know nothing other than people are suffering due to a terrible drought.  Orsik's position is slightly exaggerated, because he is actively looking for signs and portents.  Mind you, he has some very valid points, but they're points that would take a smarter man than he to actually put together if you weren't already looking for them.

[Jeikor]

I made some changes to that post. Is that better?

[Rilbur]

Sure.

[Rilbur]

Zerg, do you know what a palisade is?  Going to give you a chance to revisit Zerris's decision before you enter the gates.  Also, revisiting my description of the sign to be more explicit on something.

[Zergrinch]

My understanding is that it is a fence post. I see no reason for a sign indicating the distance to the village as anything out of the ordinary.

Well, maybe the character can put two and two together, having such wonderful passive Perception and Investigation. But not me, the player

[Rilbur]

My understanding is that it is a fence post. I see no reason for a sign indicating the distance to the village as anything out of the ordinary.

Well, maybe the character can put two and two together, having such wonderful passive Perception and Investigation. But not me, the player

 

A palisade is a defensive wall, made by inserting timbers in a row.  Think the kind of fortifications the pilgrims would make against Indian raids, by cutting down trees then inserting their trunks into the ground in a close-set wall.

 

And there is a sign, saying '5 miles to Red Larch' that has been knocked over into the weeds right outside the front gate.

[Zergrinch]

Here's the group ability PNG.

 

 

Corrections:

1. You have an older version of Zerris Gorba's sheet.  The most current version is here.
2. I miscalculated Ignaciden's HP.  It should be 23 instead of 21: 14 from class (6 + 4 + 4), 3 from Draconic Ancestry, and 6 from Constitution (3 x 2).

[Rilbur]

Zerris's little practical joke is enough to save you guys from a surprise round, but what I'm wondering is where the crossed wire is.

 

I thought, after I mentioned the sign, that the actual issue was pretty obvious.  A sign reading '5 miles to red larch' right outside the gates of the town you thought was Red Larch, seems like a pretty obvious red flag that maybe the town in front of you isn't Red Larch.  Was I too subtle, or..?

[Zergrinch]

I don't consider it unusual to have two palings - an outer layer and an inner layer.  The inner layer protects the village itself, while the outer layer keeps out the wild animals and protects the farms and pastures.

 

No practical joke intended, by the way.  As I've told Kyle Aarons before, I don't do subtle.  You have to hit me on the head with a clue bat.

[Rilbur]

I don't consider it unusual to have two palings - an outer layer and an inner layer.  The inner layer protects the village itself, while the outer layer keeps out the wild animals and protects the farms and pastures.

 

In other words, I totally failed with the description.  The palisade (paling) wasn't big enough to be an outer defense.  It was around a (relatively small) 'village' sized area.

[Jeikor]

I need someone to roll for me. My attempt to open an account at Unseen Servant failed. Although I should try again on the laptop this time.

 

 

Also in the Player's Handbook online I could not find a description for the cantrips, create bonfire and control fire, or for the 1st level spell, Ice Knife.

[Zergrinch]

Those spells are listed in the Elemental Evil Player's Companion - a free supplement that goes with Princes of the Apocalypse.

[Rilbur]

Good grief, it's taken me nearly an hour to build up the results of the first round.  OUCH.

 

Anyway, I'm currently writing up the narrative, and I want to make 2 points.

 

One, it looks like Jeikor's characters never got the 500 'bonus' starting gold I handed out.  You may want to adjust them.  (Splint mail for Myles costs 200 GP)

 

Second, is on how I resolve things.  Mechanics tend to serve the narrative.  You'll note that narratively Orsik is going first, despite being very late in the initiative order.  That's because he charged.  It's assumed someone who tried to get themselves up in front is trying to shield the rest of the party.  Since we're doing this theater of the mind, in general the decision to shield the party is the act of shielding the party -- you'll succeed because you tried.  If the enemy is explicitly attempting to ambush you, they'll probably succeed in return unless something happens to stop them.

 

I'm resolving the attacks in order, but since we don't have a map I'm fudging the move actions to serve the requested narrative.

[Zergrinch]

Hahaha. Now, try it with a menage-a-trois with the sides fighting each other

Have to admit, I really wish there was a way to get a dice roller in here...

[Jeikor]

BTW- I did get on Unseen Servant through the laptop. Now what? LOL Got to learn how to use it.

 

 

I didn't see an initiative order but since Zerris and Zozo started I went ahead and posted. But you will notice I chose targets not attacked by anyone else.

[Zergrinch]

If you have any area of effect attacks, now's the best time to use them.

[Rilbur]

Hahaha. Now, try it with a menage-a-trois with the sides fighting reach other

 

Wouldn't have been much more difficult.  It's the number of monsters as much as anything else that made it difficult -- that and having to link each and every action rather than just doing a quick bit of typing.

 

It'd be easier to use an actual die and just transpose the numbers in rather than fiddling around with unseen servant, and go a lot quicker.

[Zergrinch]

The main problem I had was positioning. Finally caved in by using a battle map after AoE spells started being flung left and right.

But don't worry, it does get better over time as you find tricks to speed things up.

For your current game, I would like to request that you separate out the bandits who are in melee, and the ones who are ranged. Helps us to make better decisions on which target to prioritize. Right now I'm operating under the assumption that 1-4 are melee and the rest are ranged.

For this round, Jeikor, we may want to thin the herd. Avoid AoEs for now, and target the Faerie Fired bandits with weapon or spell attacks, since you get advantage.

We should probably do some focus firing as well. 1 dead enemy is better than 2 half dead enemies because the dead enemy can't hurt you.

[Rilbur]

I've actually done a lot of theater of the mind type games, and in the end the key comes down to communication.  Feel free to ask questions like 'how many can I get in my faerie fire without hitting a party member', and I'll spit out a result.  The fun thing is that as a DM, I'm actively looking for ways to let your characters be cool, so I'll probably tend to fudge in your favor.  (I give you a challenge by finding a way to make the monsters cool too... like throwing a bunch of bandits at you who hid from inside a fake 'town')

 

For your current game, I would like to request that you separate out the bandits who are in melee, and the ones who are ranged. Helps us to make better decisions on which target to prioritize. Right now I'm operating under the assumption that 1-4 are melee and the rest are ranged.

 

Correct.  I'll add in that the archery bandits are in 2 groups of 4, one on either side of the 'gate'.

 

And...  I've recently been watching Faerie Tale.  Ignaciden suddenly has me thinking of Natsu.

[Rilbur]

Oh, something else I should mention -- you guys are definitely noticing that some of these guys are better than the others.  Or mechanically...  I rolled their actual HP out, instead of taking the average.