Good thing we brought the frog jerky
posted in Giantfall |We had a great game on Saturday.
Unfortunately, we were missing Duncan, who plays the Sorceror Frosti. He was home sick. In fact, we wound up having a round table
discussion on how to handle missing players. Since Brookes values consistency in her game world, my solution of having the ground open up and swallow them wasn’t appreciated; even when the ground could open up and re-spew them the next session. Rather, we decided to have them zombified; they wouldn’t make decisions or offer help, but could fight / hunt / explore. They’d get half experience points for the session.
Since Frosti wasn’t there, I’ll be a little more descriptive about the game.
With Frosti gone, there was nobody to encourage us to hold on to the keys and not enter the barrow. In theory, we’re following an evil wizard, and he’s disappeared near here (the tracks go into this abandoned village and do not leave.) We’ve found some clues that point to the barrow outside of town as holding an artifact that Surtur (Evil Fire Giant God) desires; and we think the wizard is a follower of Surtur. So the rest of us found the way to open the magic door and we’ve entered.
We’ve allowed Brand to open the door. That’s because nobody else was … eager … to handle the stuff. He held the glowing gem and the runestone in one hand, and sprinkled the Dust of the Dead in front of him. One intense and better-crafted-than-I-can-do special effect later, he had a glowing brand of Surtur’s flaming sword on his palm (ouch!), no runestone, a malevolently glowing red gem and a doorway. We entered, descended the staircase, and was faced with another door. Luckily, there was a socket for the red gem, which opened the doors. We proceeded inward. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
The the passage eventually opened into a room with doors on the cardinal points (N,E,W,S). We entered from the east. The room had a firepit in the center, charred books and scrolls in the pit, frescoes on the walls. We followed the right wall to the north exit, and began to go down the stairs; loud clanging bells announced us to the entire area. We had stumbled upon a trap! We backed up and moved to the western exit. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
We moved into the next room; again, circular, exits on the cardinal points. The room had an altar in the center, some glowing fungus growing from some (probably alchemical) stuff spilled on the altar. Experimenting with the fungus wasn’t fruitful (heh). Following the right wall, the first passageway out was completely collapsed. The next, the western exit, ended in a very hot bricked up passage. The southern exit opened to a large room filled with trees (remember, we’re underground!). As we entered the room, Grim in the lead, he was attacked by some foes hidden in the trees and a crossbow bolt was sticking from his shoulder. Brand moved up and helped Grim form and hold a shieldwall as the rest of us moved in to assist. Here, the Zombie Frosti was very useful- he had the ‘killshot’ on three of our four foes. They turned out to be … dwarves, with metallic skin and flaming hair, living in and under metal trees. As they died, their bodies melted into the floor. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
When I tried to open a discussion with them (“Hi, I’m the bard Roscoe Roadswallow, and this is my backup band, the Swallowers”) they announced that we had invaded the “tomb of Surtur” and that they would defend unto the death, as long as he-who-called-them didn’t send them home. So they didn’t stop attacking us- no matter how often we gave them a chance to surrender. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
This was an intense, sweat-filled, nerve wracking battle; part of our problem was the two foes in the trees with the crossbows.
When that was over, there was no treasure to be found. We retreated to our sanctuary in the village to recover; as we were leaving, the alarm went off in the northern passage. This gave us the realization that we had left the doors open; the door to the exit and the door with the lock that used the gem to open it. It was obvious to us that someone was in here with us. We rushed out, being completely out of magic and low on health, and both of our main fighters were out of commission. We locked the door behind us, hopefully keeping whomever followed us in there. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
We returned to the sanctuary, and found it in ruins; someone had shattered the door and rifled through our stuff. We spent an uneasy two days recuperating from the battle.
We returned to the barrow, and back to the “tree room” where we saw that someone had bent one of the trees completely over and had mauled it. The rest of the party waited in there, searching the trees while Grim and I worked our way into a smaller room to the east, which turned out to be connected to the room with the frescos (the southern exit we had never taken). In the trees, they found some golden leaves. Oddly, Frosti didn’t say anything.
hmm, this is becoming very wordy
Past the alarm to the north, we defeated some sort of sightless humanoids who wanted to rip our fresh flesh from our frail forms; they wanted to eat us. Their passages, while interesting, don’t yet seem to be related to the exit to the west, the hot bricked up exit.
The hot, bricked up exit. Grim and Brand battled down the bricks, and entered; this room was very warm. On a black throne near the west wall, was a form in black armor inlaid with designs of Surtur’s flaming sword. On each side was a smoking pot. We moved forward; the heat was oppressive. Grim shot an arrow at the form on the throne (he’s a little impulsive) but at the last moment, the arrow veered to the side; it seemed to be magically deflected. We encouraged Frosti to cast “detect magic,” at which point he announced that the pots were very magical and the form was lesser so- and it was mostly protective magic. We moved closer. Brand opened the visor of the armor; inside was a man. He was not “alive” but not dead either. We’re not sure what his story is. Balthor hosed him down with some holy water. (The fountain that Eilidh cleaned is providing holy water). Nothing changed. So the fighters took off the figure’s armor and tied him up, while the rest of us stood guard. Then on searching the room, another exit was found; behind the throne, to the west. We opened the door ….
And that’s where we left it for next month. 
Tentative date is May 17, 2PM at David’s apartment.
