Caves of Chaos: Heading West!

 Session 7 was played on 9/19

Io the thief
Theiss of Gond, cleric

After returning to the keep, the party brings the bodies of their fallen to the chapel for last rites before burial. The head priestess Kestra is impressed by their dedication.

After resting for the night, they pay Kask and Gyg for another day, and hire Burnore, Brymore, and Yar, and trek west from the keep along the Old King Way, traveling for a full day, mostly along the edge of the light woods to the north. They pass some isolated farmsteads, a tiny hamlet, before arriving at a walled river village.

After talking with the gate guards they're allowed in, and directed to the tavern. Talking with the locals they hear about the goings on, including owlbear attacks, dragon sightings, bandits way laying smaller caravans, including a caravan they were expecting this past week. It should have passed the keep not too long ago.

Kask knows the caravan they're talking about. It left the keep the same day the one he was a part of arrived.

The next morning the party departed the the walked village and heads back to the keep, keeping an eye out for the bandits. Their sharper lookout paid off, as they spotted a break in the woods big enough for a single wagon to pass through, and wagon wheel tracks heading along it.

Io sneaks parallel to the path in the woods, and spots 2 bandits in tree stands keeping a watch. Unfortunately one spots her, and she runs for it.

Rejoining the party they all book it down the path back to the keep, and after taking to the guards at the gate gain an audience with the castellan to tell him about the camp. He wants to hire them to take care of the bandits, and offers 15gp per bandit captured or killed.

Gains:
Losses:
Kills:

Caves of Chaos: Sticky Sweet and Rotting Flesh

Session 6 was played on 9/12

Io the thief
Gizzard Wannabe the Wizard
Theiss of Gond, cleric
Tiptoe the thief
Boots the ranger
Amnyuthist the halfling

The party hires Garwood and Kask and head back to the swamp, aiming to finish off the lizarmen mound. On the way, they meet a dozen warriors headed to the keep. They’d just come from the mound, and report that they’ve looted and burned it. The 2 groups continue on their way.

Deciding that a trip to the swamp is a wasted trip if they don’t do anything, they begin to stomp around, hoping to turn something up. Something, in this case ends up being a giant bee. They follow it at a distance to the hive inside the trunk of a massive dead tree. Not wanting to try to fight them, the party has Wannabe put them to sleep. Io then squeezes into the hive and collects some of the honey. Tiptoe follows and collects a little, but a bee makes its way out from deeper in the hive and attacks. Tiptoe is hurt, but runs for it.

They make it back to the Keep, soggy, but with some honey that Wannabe thinks has some magical healing properties.

The next day they hire Gyg and Vlad and head to the caves, and explore the goblin caves… finding them empty?!? Well, almost empty. 4 dead goblins rise up and attack the party. Vlad and Garwood don’t survive the encounter. They take the bodies, and bring them back to the keep.

Gains: healing honey
Losses: Garood, Vlad
Kills: 4 goblin zombies, 1 giant bee

Caves of Chaos: Swampwalk

 Session 4 was played on 8/29

Venus the Halfling
Io the thief
Gizzard the Wizard
Theiss the cleric
Gloin the Dwarf

Checking the tavern, they find 5 caravan guards interested in going for an adventure. Especially for a gold piece a day each! Rather than return to the caves, the party decides to explore the swamp and look for the lizardman encampment. Venus the halfling scouts ahead. Wandering for many soggy hours, they deal with numerous bug bites, and spot a variety of wildlife before they see signs of the lizardmen.

Eventually they do find the lizardmen mound, and in the heat and humidity of the late afternoon the lizardmen guards are sluggish and don’t spot the party. Gizzard uses his sleep spell to ensure that they can approach the mound unbothered. They quickly dispatch the sleeping lizardmen, and then fight the ones from inside the mound that try to come out to get the party. Sadly for the lizardmen, because of the narrowness of the mound’s entrance, they aren’t able to mass against the party effectively and after a couple more deaths, they just close up the entrance till the party goes away.

Checking over the corpses, they find one was wearing a heavy gold chain around it’s neck. They take it and head back toward the keep. On the way they spot 7 skeletons marching through the muck toward them. Theiss holds up her holy symbol and sends the skeletons running back into the swamp.

Gains: gold chain
Losses Kril the man at arms
Kills: 6 lizardmen

Caves of Chaos: Goblin Guards

 Session 3 was played on 8/22

Dramatis Personae:
Io the Thief
Wannabe Gizzard the Wizard
Tiptoe the Thief
Venus the Halfling

Starting in the tavern, feeling flush from the wyvern’s treasure, the party hires the 3 caravan guards who are between jobs, and willing to follow the party off to the caves. Norwood, Barin, and Harmyr are hopeful that the adventurer’s luck continues.

Taking the Old King’s Road, they head to the box canyon and to the goblin cave on the southern side. Almost immediately they’re confronted with 6 goblin guards. The fighting is chaotic, and the party begins to back track almost immediately after Norwood drops. Things are looking better as they get back to the cave mouth and half the goblins are down, but then Barin takes a nasty hit and drops. The remaining goblins suffer a string of bad luck and drop right after Barin goes down. Harmyr and the thieves grab the bodies of Norwood and Barin and start making for the exit of the canyon.

Their escape is interrupted when 6 more goblins come out of the cave, and start tossing spears and loosing arrows at the party. They drop the bodies of their fallen and book it back to the road.

The party makes it back to the keep, and has a somber dinner. Their spirits are lifted by a visiting priest who joins them for some lively conversation. His acolytes are less jovial, having taken a vow of silence. In the end the priest excuses himself, as he needs to converse with the castilian. It isn’t until after he’s left the tavern that the barkeep informs the party that the priest left them to pay his bill. If nothing else, they do hear a rumor about some lost magical armor hidden on one of the southern caves.

Gains:
Losses Norwood, Barin
Kills: 6 goblin guards

DM Notes: So many 1s were rolled on both sides…. SO MANY!!

Caves of Chaos: Donkeys & Dragons

Session 2 was played on 6/12/24

Dramatis Personae:
Glyn the Dwarf
Berm the Fighter
Thorin Oakenshield the Dwarf
Io the Thief
Wannabe Gizzard the Wizard
Lighter the Fighter
Fraud the Dwarf
Trina the Elf
Tiptoe the Thief
Poppy the Barbarian

Sighting of a dragon in the nearby hills got everyone at the Keep talking. Several smaller caravans and lone wagons have gone missing nearby. The speculation is that it might be lairing at the old abandoned watchtower. Our bold adventurers decide not only to go face this dragon, but to bring along every able bodied individual in the tavern willing to go with them. For extra gold they managed to convince 4 caravan guards to take their day off and spend it dragon hunting! 2 specialists (thieves) and an elf also tag along. The party also bought a donkey and half a dozen chickens. I thought the donkey was to help them bring the dragon’s treasure back, but I was wrong.

Heading up into the wooded hills north of the Keep, the party kept a lookout for the dragon. They spotted the watchtower and approached carefully. Sending the sneaky ones ahead to scout, the rest keep watch on both the tower and the sky…

The thieves make it to the base of the ruined tower without attracting the notice of the dragon… Easy to do since it wasn’t home! One thief climbed a nearby tree to get a look at the top of the tower, and built on it was clearly a nest. The ruined tower was easy to climb, and the thieves scaled it and began to dig around in the nest. The rest of the party went to the base of the tower to collect whatever the thieves could toss down. A few of the hirelings kept the donkey and some chickens nearby, but away from the base of the tower.

As the thieves started tossing all the gold and gems they could find over the edge of the tower, the rest of the party scrambled to pick it up and bag it. They were working fast, and managed to find a decent haul before the dragons roar echoed across the hillside. The thieves ducked down, trying to keep out of sight. Under the trees, the hirelings with the animals started making a ruckus to get the dragon’s attention, and set the donkey to run. The dragon roared and chased after the animal, and as soon as it had passed the adventurers and their meatshields, they all took off running in the opposite direction away from where the donkey and dragon ran. As they ran, they could hear the scream of the donkey end abruptly.  

The party’s plan worked, and they’d made off with a good chunk of the wyvern’s (not a true dragon) treasure.

Gains: roughy 1500ep, 1500gp
Losses donkey and chickens
Kills:

---

There was a minor interruption during the game, as a bat managed to get into the building and several players worked together to make sure the doors and windows were opened to let the poor creature escape.

The Caves of Chaos! Session 1

Back in June at a work retreat I ran a couple of evening sessions of B/X D&D for my coworkers. At the end of July we picked back up again, and I’ve been running a near weekly session since. At the time I’m writing this, we’ve played through 11 sessions. All of my players are novices, never having played an RPG before,

My introduction to them was that this is an old school game where death is pretty common if you’re stupid or unlucky, that success is measured by gold far more than by bodies, and that there is a literal war being fought by civilization and the forces of law against the agents of chaos, and while this battle is largely fought by beings like angels and demons, the efforts of mortals can shift the balance. That I would be starting the game on one of the borders between law and chaos, a Keep on the Borderlands. How they choose to play, and where they go in the world is entirely up to them. There is no plot line for them to follow, there is no story that they’re expected to adhere to, that I would be presenting them with NPCs, places, quest choices and that the tales that would be told of their adventures would depend on what actions they take, and the success or failure of those actions.

The first night there were over a dozen players and observers. The second was about half. Since then it ranges from 2-5 players, which isn’t bad given that we’re playing from 4:30-6pm on Thursday afternoons. I’m thrilled to be able to share this with my coworkers, and now I’m going to share their tales with you!

Session 1 was played on 6/10/24

Dramatis Personae:
Glyn the Dwarf
Berm the Fighter
Thorin Oakenshield the Dwarf
Io the Thief
Wannabe Gizzard the Wizard
Lighter the Fighter
Fraud the Dwarf
Trina the Elf
Tiptoe the Thief
Poppy the Barbarian

The party arrives at the Keep on the Borderland, and their first challenge is to get into the keep. The guards keeping watch question the party, logging their names and professions. They warn the self described “thieves” that antisocial behavior will not be tolerated within the walls of the keep, and to keep their noses clean. Also, maybe announcing to the town guard that you’re a thief is maybe not the best intro.

After getting some directions, they make their way to the inn and secure accommodations for the night, and then head to the tavern for food, drink, and rumors. They talk with a guard captain, learn about the Caves of Chaos, that there’s a local dragon that has been causing problems lately that they think is lairing up in the hills in an old ruined watch tower, and that there are both lizardmen in the swamps and bandits all around (10gp/bandit killed, 15gp for any brought back alive).

After lunch they explore the keep more, and try to visit the jeweler, but he doesn’t want to talk to them till they have something to sell, or enough cash to buy something, and isn’t letting them into his store.

The next morning they head out to the canyon. In a copse of trees the party hears someone. Wannabe tosses a vial of burning oil into the trees, and with an amazing stroke of luck manages to hit someone hiding in the brush! His screams echo in the canyon as he burns to death. A second human runs screaming from his burning friend and the party deeper into the canyon. THe party puts out the burning body and the brush that was starting to catch, and check the body, recovering a crude copper medallion inscribed with a 7 pointed star.

Heading up to one of the cave entrances on the north side of the canyon, and looking in see a wall of heads looking back. Within they hear someone speaking, though no one knows the language. Getting ready to head into the cave and turn east to the voices, they’re charged by 4 guards. The party manages to kill 2/4 in the initial assault. More orcs arrive from the other direction surprising the dwarf who was supposed to be keeping watch. The dwarf took 2 hits and dropped. Wannabe sleeps the still standing orcs to the west, while Poppy is cut down before Tiptoe and Berm cut down the last of the standing orcs.

The party quickly checks the pockets of the fallen orcs, grabs their fallen, and runs for the keep.

Gains: orc pocket change, copper medallion
Losses Poppy, Fraud
Kills: 8 orcs, 1 cultist

Expedition to the Borderlands: Session 4: Kobolds!

Session 4, May 2, 2015

The party consists of:
Melvin the Magnificient (male wizard) David
Dalip (male elf) David
Spider (male thief) Justin
Raph (male fighter) Justin

These four manage to hire a somewhat reluctant farmhand by the name of Oliver as well who joins them to improve his lot in life.

The heroes decide to not dare the Cave of Confusion and instead head into the woods to the west trying to locate the kobolds rumored to lair there for some "easy money" as it were. Luckily they don't have to wait for long, they "surprise" a group of kobolds bickering in a tiny clearing (over someone else's old campfire, a fact which may or may not be important for another session). Between many swords and one of Melvin's infamous sleep spells, the kobolds really don't have a chance. So the party ends up with five kobold captives, one of which is wounded.

Running into communication problems once again, they then decide to arrange the ropes that hold the kobolds in such a way as to allow the wounded one to flee. They continue through the woods and for a while the kobold seems too scared to run off. Eventually, however, he does disappear from sight. And since he's still bleeding, he's relatively easy to trail and leads the party to a small ravine.

Spider does some initial scouting and locates a cave mouth hidden behind a strangely arranged copse. The party ties the remaining kobolds to a tree 60 feet from the entrance and then descends into the darkness. After about 25 feet, Raph promptly encounters one of the classic denizens of early 1980s dungeons: The pit trap. "Argh!" and down he goes as a bunch of kobolds jump around a corner and barrage the intrepid group with javelins. Spider tries to shoot the kobolds with his crossbow as Oliver helps Raph out of the pit and Melvin is trying to illuminate the scene with his lantern. The next round has everyone clash in melee but then Melvin hears feeping noises from the other side of the corridor and decides that this has to end quickly: The second sleep spell of the day! All six kobolds fall either under blades or from the sleep spell and the party quickly gathers up the javelins. Instead of investigating the noise that startled Melvin, however, they decide to go the other way, heading further east.

Raph and Spider now use javelins to carefully probe ahead, weary of another pit trap. As the party approaches another T-intersection, their paranoia of another trap is sadly disappointed as nothing dangerous whatsoever appears. They head further east and detect kobold voices far ahead, many of them. Melvin guesses around 20. Yikes! They shut off their lantern and have Dalip inch closer to take a look with his Elven eyes. Sure enough, there seems to be a large cavern with many, many shapes moving about. Time to be wise and turn the other way: back to the intersection to go north instead.

Much to the party's chagrin they come to yet another "dangerous" t-intersection after about 30 feet. But once again there doesn't seem to be a trap anywhere. To the west they can see a sturdy wooden door reinforced with iron bands set into a mortared wall, a strange sight indeed in a mine-like dungeon. Not wanting to make a lot of noise they decide to skip the door and once again head east.

As Spider peeks around the next corner, he's confronted with an arrow speeding towards his face. Luckily the kobold sniper didn't do so well with his attack! Spider thinks he has seen a total of three rather large kobolds in the next room, and the party decides to wait for those guys to rush in. Which doesn't happen, the kobolds apparently being keenly aware of their advantage. After about half a minute of quiet, the party decides to attack so they jump around the corner and throw javelins or run at the kobolds with swords as the case may be. The fight ends quickly, lucky rolls be praised, but one kobold gets away and flees to the north, slamming another sturdy iron-bound door behind him. Our heroes quickly loot the two big kobolds and collect two bows, 40 arrows, and two relatively shiny axes. Oliver finally has some real weapons!

Not wanting to attack a room full of kobolds already prepared for them, the party decides to backtrack to the other door. After a failed attempt by Dalip, Raph smashes in the door just fine, making a lot of noise in the process. Total sadface however because the treasure-hunters have stumbled into the kobold's larder, not a copper piece around. Just pickled meat, healthy-looking veggies, and partially eaten (demi-)human remains (maybe a delicacy?).

A brief discussion ensues enumerating their options. The decision surprises everybody: Attack that room the big kobold fled into, the one they didn't want to attack before. Reasons? Who knows!

On their way back, however, they get ambushed again at the exact same spot as before, the kobold who ran away earlier having taken up his sniping position again. Apparently someone gave him a good talking-to and got his morale back up? He doesn't last too long, but at least he's teaching the party another valuable lesson about life in the deeps: Spider passes out after being hit by one of his arrows, brought to 2 hit points. :/ The party, always caring deeply for their mortally wounded companions, stashes him comfortably in a corner of the guard room before heading north. (Reminder: I still have to roll for the mortal wound here!)

Finally, the ominous door! Strangely enough it's open and from what they can see in the dim light of their lantern (or with Dalip's infravision when they extinguish the lantern temporarily) it's deserted. Not a kobold soul in sight! The party inches towards the door carefully and Raph slowly makes his way in, followed by everybody else. They find a whole lot of trash, a large bed with curtains drawn all around it, and an alcove in the opposite wall across which an old blanket has been stretched curtain-style. Raph inches towards the bed, and Dalip decides to take a shot (literally) at the blanket. CRITICAL HIT! After a loud, deep roar a HUGE kobold jumps through the blanket and rushes Dalip with an equally huge axe.

At the same time Raph pulls back the curtain around the bed only to be jumped by five (!) kobold wives with tiny little kobold daggers. Both Dalip and Raph are lucky again, only Raph gets hit by a single dagger for almost no damage whatsoever. Dalip lands a lucky blow on the kobold chieftain who immediately decides to parley, offering the chest in the corner of the room as the price for his life. The party accepts the bargain until they realize that the chest is mostly full of copper pieces while the chieftain is hiding something large and glinting under his chainmail armor. Not wanting to be tricked out of that well-deserved wealth, they attack once more, killing the chieftain and four of his wives. One, however, makes it out of the room and down the corridor, screaming for her life.

Finally something worthwhile to pick off of a dead monster: The gold chain the kobold chieftain was wearing has a huge gem attached to it, and everybody is very excited about their (most likely) improved financial situation. Now they just have to make it out of the dungeon alive, which could prove challenging if the kobold wife made it back to the large group of kobolds near the entrance. So everybody tries to sneak out very quietly indeed.

As they get to the t-intersection turning south, the adventurers hear a big commotion. They shut down their lantern to take advantage of Dalip's infravision again. Much to everybody's surprise, the kobolds seem to be fleeing. Apparently their morale broke after hearing that their chieftain is dead and all they want to do is get away! The party waits things out and after the last kobold has run past their position they slowly sneak further south. Crickets. They sneak to the east where they discovered the large cavern earlier. Still crickets. They toss the place, now abandoned and empty. Still nothing. Oh wait, they find a curiously wrapped package that contains a dark red silk gown, something the kobolds apparently took off of an unlucky merchant at some point. Otherwise: Crickets.

It slowly dawns on Melvin and his stalwart band (including Oliver who's dragging a passed-out Spider along) that they might actually have won big here: More treasure than ever before and an entire tribe of "dangerous" humanoids vanquished? Vana should bless a poet with a tale like that!

Nothing is between them and the exit, literally nothing. But yet, there is still the room on the other side of the pit trap, the room that Melvin heard noises out of during the initial kobold ambush. Should they leave, richer and presumably safe? Or should they investigate yet another dangerous part of the dungeon?

The party enters a smelly chamber full of trash and refuse, probably kobold excrement as well. There are various heaps of "stuff" around the room, especially around the outer walls, that do not at all seem inviting. Still, the group makes their way to the center of the chamber to get a good look around when...

A loud shriek out of the northeastern corner of the room sets off a strange commotion: The heaps of "stuff" start to tremble and all around the player characters giant rats work their way up out of the goop. As Melvin turns his lantern to the northeast, a giant rat-like monstrosity, standing upright and holding a sword, let's out another blood-curdling shriek. The giant rats set upon the party as they try to beat a hasty retreat. Melvin and Raph get gnawed on briefly but the "rat king" doesn't press his advantage and let's the party get away.

Phew.

The journey back to The Keep is uneventful. Bringing the head of the kobold chieftain with them the Captain of the Guard praises Melvin and his compatriots for their accomplishment. He even helps them obtain a Potion of Healing for Spider from the Curate running the keep's chapel. Selling the kobold chieftain's gold chain to the traveling Jewel Merchant nets them 800 gp, and they make another 50 gp from the dress they found which fits the Jewel Merchant's wife perfectly. Melvin immediately sets up a headquarters in one of the apartments that's available for rent.

And scene! :-)

---

Session report written by Peter the DM.

Lions and Gnolls and Demons, Oh My!

Session 3, February 7, 2015 
The party consists of:
Melvin the Magnificient (male wizard,  (a slightly transmuted) David (aka me)
Deilip (male elf rescued from the bugbears) - David (aka me)
Yesod Zul (male-ish fighter) Elli
Albert Franklin (male cleric) - Ed
Skalgos (male wizard) - Jonathan
Spider (male thief) - Justin
DM - Peter (Who gets author credit for this post!)

Yesod and Albert are "barbarians" from the demon-haunted northlands beyond The Keep,
Skalgos and Spider are running from Baron Akar's Law (stealing from the wrong personage is never a good idea).
Everybody else (notably Nayla, Raph, and Alsador) is busy licking their wounds.

On the morning of Day 5, Melvin begins recruiting "new help" for his "quest" to find Lord Kendall. Luckily everybody is on board as soon as an equitable split of loot is agreed upon. The group heads out along the north road in the middle of the thunderstorm (that chafes in plate!). After a few hours they unexpectedly run into a hungry Mountain Lion. It charges at Yesod and inflicts some gruesome scratches, but Melvin saves the day with his Sleep spell. Yesod promptly covers himself in even more blood by skinning the beast and extracting its brain.

As more lightning and thunder strikes in the never-ending luke-warm rain, the group decides that they've had enough. They tie the carcass to Skalgos' staff and carry it back to the keep where they can unexpectedly sell it as a delicacy. Yesod grosses out about half the keep's population when he (?) starts squishing brain matter all over the Mountain Lion skin to cure it. Meanwhile Skalgos manages to "cook up" a relationship with the taverner and they prepare Mountain Lion stew together. All is set for a dry night indoors when suddenly...

Flames to the South: The Monastary of Oghma is under attack! Chaos ensues as residents of the keep panic and even the guard has some trouble getting their shit together. Melvin of course volunteers the services of his group to investigate what is going on and the adventurers once again find themselves outside in the pouring rain, heading south this time.

It's getting dark by the time they sight the monastery. The gate is smashed and the palisade has been torn down in several places. All the buildings, including the main temple that presumably housed the library, are on fire. From afar Melvin and friends spot a large group of hyena-headed humanoids in the process of clearing out. But as the they debate what to do next, they are surprised by a bunch of arrows fired out of the nearby bushes.

Four sneaky little Kobolds were apparently stationed here as a rear-guard, and whoever put them there must have impressed upon them that they need to kill any reinforcements The Keep might send. But despite the ineffectual attacks of Deilip they don't last very long: One gets blown to bits by Skalgos' magic skulls wreathed in turqoise flame (aka magic missle), another is skewered by Yesod, and a third backstabs himself on Spider's waiting blade. The fourth one makes it out though. Deilip gives chase but loses the little bugger in the rain after a few rounds.

Weary of attacking the gnolls the party decides to send Spider to scout ahead quietly while the rest of them hide in the bushes and wait things out. Skalgos has the idea of interrogating the kobold before he bleeds out, a task made more difficult by the fact that his victim is in and out of consciousness. In hopes of improving the situation Albert casts Cure Light Wounds on the kobold who promptly decides to keep "playing dead" anyway. Of course they also discover at this point that nobody in the group speaks kobold to begin with. Albert at least gets a gagged pet-kobold out of this.

Without the usual concerto of jingling plate armor in tow, Spider has no problem sneaking up on the monastery. He peers around a breach in the palisade and catches sight of the biggest, meanest gnoll leaving at the back of his troops. The bodies of a few gnolls and many kobolds lie strewn about between the burning buildings, as do the bodies of many monks of Oghma. He decides that there's really nobody to save anymore and returns to the rest of the group with the grim news.

Since the gnolls seem to be leaving, and since the kobold that got away apparently didn't report on the player characters, Melvin decides that they should at least take a first-hand look at the massacre to make sure that there really are no survivors. So they cautiously approach the place together, ready for a fight that never comes: The gnolls actually left, no ambush! However, a more detailed look at the site of the battle reveals that two of the dead humans are not monks of Oghma at all, indeed they seem to be clerics of Erythnul! (DM Note - Sorry I retconned this, originally I said Hextor but I had my gods mixed up.) As the rain puts out the last of the fires, a brief investigation of the main temple reveals that most likely the humanoid forces came for certain books in Oghma's library, potentially a big setback for the forces of good!

As our group is about to head back, a troop of guards finally arrives from The Keep. Melvin wants to report to Gilda the Castellan, but the captain of the guard recommends talking to the Bailiff or his scribe instead (apparently the two room together and are pretty sensible, something that Melvin feels cannot be said for Gilda). The mood at The Keep is certainly at a new low now that the forces of Chaos have shown themselves this brazenly.

The next day (no more rain but lots of mosquitos!) is spent on an uneventful trip up the northern road, mostly to get a better feel for the territory that Melvin believes Lord Kendall would be held prisoner in. The party encounters one of the patrols from The Keep tasked with keeping the North Road safe, but nothing else of importance transpires during the trip. Later in the evening, however, the group finds out that the patrol they had met earlier never reported back in.

Day 7 sees the adventurers return to where they last saw the patrol themselves. They find a small force of guards from The Keep a little north of that position, clearly freaked out by what they found: Bits and pieces of (apparently) two of the missing guards, no sight of the other two (or the missing pieces for that matter). Yesod and Albert decide to kick it ranger-style and look for tracks, and despite his rather dimwitted nature Yesod seems to have a real knack for this kind of thing. (The soaked, marshy ground might have helped a little.) The group discovers the tracks of a large, heavy creature with hoofs, apparently bipedal. Melvin concluces that a demon must be on the lose, after all the entire keep was abuzz last night with talk about the evils of the underworld coming to swallow the borderlands whole...

Unperturbed by this possibilty the barbarians lead the group on a chase of this mysterious monstrosity. A few hours later they find a tall but narrow cave mouth the tracks lead to and once again it is decided that Spider should scout ahead by himself. When a few minutes later they hear the thief shout "SOMETHING'S REALLY WRONG HERE!" they all charge in, only to find out what exactly is wrong. Immediately after entering the cave, the group becomes first dizzy and then horribly confused. They cannot seem to recall where they just were and how they got to this particular point of the cave.

The group decides to stay together and not lose sight of one another (smart move) as they slowly creep into a cave they saw a red glow in. Strange clicking sounds can be heard as well, but nobody seems to be sure from where exactly. As they enter the cave proper, Yesod catches the strangest sight out of the corner of her (?) eye: To the left of the tunnel they came down a smaller tunnel branches off, and Spider is clinging to the walls of that smaller tunnel in a desperate attempt not to be seen. As Yesod clears his (?) throat, Spider whips around in confusion which quickly turns into relief. Then the fire beetles attack.

As luck would have it the adventurers react almost instantaneously: They all make their way down the smaller tunnel, leaving Yesod the Barbarian in the back to block the beetles at a choke point. Maybe not a strategy to use against intelligent monsters who could cut around to the other side, but for the beetles it worked great. A rather entertaining battle ensues as Melvin and Skalgos hang back, Spider repeatedly fires his crossbow to no avail (bolts everywhere!), Albert takes Skalgos' halberd and tries to help from the second rank, Deilip takes Skalgos' halberd from Albert and tries to help from the second rank and promptly gets it stuck across the hallway, Albert throws hammer after dagger after dagger without hitting a beetle, and so on. Yesod eventually succeeds in killing all the beetles with only minor help from one magic missle and one crossbow bolt that actually hits. Victory!

Sadly the beetles do not have anything valuable on them, so after the battle is won the group is back where they started: Somewhere deep in the caverns with no idea how to get out. They decide to head down the smaller hallway, then an even smaller hallway again and luckily Yesod can stop them before tumbling into another cave full of beetles. They successfully avoid a strange cave in which some flapping sounds are heard, stumble a bit further down the tunnel, and much to their surprise suddenly find themselves at the mouth of the cave again. What gives?

A quick decision is made that heading back inside with a wounded barbarian would not be a good idea, especially since they saw no sign whatsoever yet of the large demon they are hunting. So they strategically withdraw back to The Keep to solve this mystery another day. Adventure ends. :-)

Expedition to the Keep on the Borderlands session 2

This session was played on June 28, 2014 at Titan Games. Session 1 can be found here. Unlike that first report, this one was written by Peter Fröhlich, the DM!

The party (initially) consists of Melvin the Magnificient (male wizard), Wandra (female fighter, Melvin's bodyguard), Nayla (female fighter), and Alsador (male cleric of Tyr); Jax and Gorinka said they need to rest their weary bones.

Chronic financial difficulties make Melvin spend his last few gold pieces on 12 flasks of oil to smoke out the bugbears. The party returns to the bugbear lair and mounts their fiery assault. Sadly the bugbears don't seem to take the bait but ring a gong to alert the entire tribe.

After a few minutes the party decides to enter the dungeon ready to spill blood and more flaming oil. However, they eventually end up caught between two bugbear forces and they also set themselves on fire twice by accident. Wandra is killed by one of the huge Bugbear flails.

The bugbear chieftain offers the party their lives as captured slaves, but Melvin won't have it. In a last desperate attempt to win the battle he throws his entire sack of oil flasks at a fire close to the chieftain. Sadly nothing happens and the party is taken prisoners.

Cut to the road south of the monastery of Oghma. The (second) party consists of Burl (male halfling), Roos (male cleric of St. Cuthbert), Aera (female fighter), and Raph (male fighter).

These four had been sent south to contact baron Akar about a week ago. When they finally had a meeting with Akar's advisor they were told that the party of Melvin the Magnificent had been dispatched north to take care of all these troubles and that everything was being handled. They proceed to the keep and have a meeting with Gilda who cannot seem to remember anything about a Melvin and his party.

However, they find out from Marut the stableboy that he had led the other party to the bugbears two days ago and that four of them had set out this morning to attack that lair. Marut agrees to show them where the cave is, and so the party sets out to investigate the fate of Melvin and his companions.

Although they take a much more stealthy approach with Burl scouting ahead carefully, they are ambushed by three bugbears at the entrance to the lair. Luckily their brief melee doesn't seem to attract more attention, so they continue to sneak into the darkness.

After lots of careful scouting they decide to launch a surprise attack at a room where Burl heard monsterous giggling. They stumble right into the love nest of the bugbear chieftain and his mate and a chaotic melee ensues. Luckily they are able to overcome the giant monster fairly quickly. Searching the room reveals some treasure as well as a key to a store room across the way where they end up finding a magic shield covered in catnip and other goodies.

Encouraged by their exploits the party ventures down a steep flight of stairs only to get ambushed by two bugbear guards throwing spears. However, as luck would have it, they once again succeed in overcoming these two guards fairly quickly.

As they investigate the lower section of the dungeon they realize that they have stumbled into the bugbear's prison. They find prisoners of all kinds of races, kobolds, orcs, even a bugbear! But more importantly, they recruit the help of two human guards from Kendall Keep who were captured on patrol as well as a dwarf and an elf. And of course they find Melvin, Alsador, and Nayla! Crates are popped open and sacks ripped apart, revealing most of the equipment that was taken from the prisoners (minus all the valuables they were carrying however).

Thus bolstered to an "army" of eleven (!) they decide to attack the final bugbear stronghold, a big community room on the upper level of the dungeon. A keg of lamp oil is taken from the store room they found earlier, and they decide to surprise the remaining bugbears by rolling this giant "Molotov Cocktail" into the big room.

Over the elf's objections most of the party also decide to rush into the room when the keg fails to explode but keeps rolling toward a huge fireplace at the end of the room. Melee is joined, bugbear heads are cracked, and everything seems to be going well until the keg of oil finally decides to blow. All the remaining bugbears are taken out, however the flames also engulf Burl and Aera who end up being burned to a crisp.

The remaining nine decide that taking down one monster lair is enough for a day's work and head back to the keep. With a very excited stable boy I might add: He was promised a platinum piece and he did get it. :-)

At the keep the captain of the guard is very appreciative that the party rescued two of his men. However he doesn't have any way to formally reward them without Gilda opening the keep's coffers. So everybody retreats to the tavern for some well-deserved rest.

However, there they once again encounter the priest of Vana, and this time he's talking with a somewhat dubious character who shares new information about the lairs of the gnolls and kobolds that he and his "merry men" supposedly uncovered in the woods to the south and west...

Expedition to the Keep on the Borderlands

On Saturday I headed up to Collector’s Corner in Bel Air to play in the Harford County Game Day. I’d signed up for the Expedition to the Borderlands B/X game, mainly because I’ve never actually played a B/X game, or Keep on the Borderlands, or even in a hex crawl. Once, ages ago, I ran Return to the Keep on the Borderlands, but didn’t really get what the big deal was at the time.

I was the last one to the table, as it was my first time to Collector’s Corner, and I took a wrong turn on the way. Peter, the DM was just getting into it, going very quickly over the basics of old school D&D. Then it was time to pick our characters. He had multiple 2nd level pregens for each class. We ended up with:

Nala the fighter played by Katherine
Alsador the cleric played by Warren
Jax the thief played by John (?)
Gorinka the dwarf played by Cathy
Melvin the Magnificent the magic-user played by me
- Wandra the Warrior, Melvin’s hireling/bodyguard

The adventure was set in a 5 mile hex with the Keep at its center. Our group was tasked by the local baron to investigate when the Keep hadn’t sent any reports recently. We started the adventure at the edge of the hex with a dwarven caravan heading back to Rockhome, and an intro combat with a pack of gnolls. Melvin’s sleep spell did drop one of them, and made another a little sluggish, but then he hid under one of the wagons.

Aside from that initial dropping of a gnoll, it would have been a very early TPK had it not been for the dwarves. Aside from winning initiative most of the 10+ rounds of combat, including the first 4 rounds in a row, we whiffed, fumbled, and missed nearly every attack roll, and our damage output was miserable when we did hit.

Did I mention that our 2nd level characters had typical ability scores for B/X? When you roll 3d6 in order, it’s not pretty. For example, Melvin had 7 Str. 14 Int. 6 Wis. 7 Dex. 9 Con. and 14 Cha. For those keeping track, thats an overall ability modifier of -2.

I know early edition is supposed to have fast combat, but that’s really only true when characters actually hit. As it was by the end of the combat we were already an hour into the game.

We pressed on with the dwarves, arriving at a small monastery surrounded by worked fields and a wooden palisade wall. The dwarves were continuing on to the west, while we would take the road north to the keep. While stopped at the monastery Melvin spouted his belief that there were in fact no gods, and that all magic was drawn from the same non-divine source. He then got to wait outside the wall. A pair of red uniformed guards from the keep were due to return, so we would all travel together. We were supposed to pass their relief on the way. We didn’t.

Upon reaching the keep, Melvin noted the blue uniformed watch standing guard. Already concerned that they hadn’t passed the guards relief, he pulled a wand from his robe and demanded to know why they were in a different uniform. Mind you, the wand was just a non-magical stick, but the guards didn’t know that. Turns out the watch and the guard have different uniforms since they do different things.

It also happens that the Lord of the Keep had ridden out nearly a week ago to investigate the sighting of undead in the swamp with 10 guards, which was why no guards took over at the monastery. Apparently both gnolls and undead are rare in these parts, and their sighting had everyone very concerned. Since we were tasked with finding out what was going on, we attempted to meet with the castellan. She refused to see us.

We stayed for the night at the inn, hired the stable boy to be our guide, and took off in the morning. A day of getting bit by mosquitoes didn’t turn up any traces of the lord or the 10 guards he took with him. We returned to the keep to head out again in the morning. That night we met a priest of Vara, the poet god. Wandra stepped on Melvin’s toes, preventing his further ranting on the false nature of gods. The priest was very interested in our tales, though his acolytes were silent “until the poetry filled their voices”.

The next morning we again headed out with the stable boy. Before reaching the marsh, the stable boy spotted something large moving off in the distance. We decided to investigate, and found a cave with signs posted outside it. Being the highly experienced group we were, we investigated subtly, letting everyone in the area know what we were about. The conclusion was ogre. Eventually Melvin proposed a plan to have half the party up on the hill across from the cave with weapons ready, the dwarf on one side of the cave and the thief on the other, with a trip line across the entryway. Melvin would then call out, and we would subdue the monster with his sleep spell.

Things went a little sideways when it turned out to be pumpkin headed bugbears. Thankfully the three that charged out all hit the tripwire and fell. Melvin ran for cover behind the dwarf, and combat was joined. Melvin took a hard hit, but remained standing. The same could not be said for the thief who went down with a single hit. The sleep spell dropped two, the other was killed. We tied up the injured sleeping bugbear, and killed the other. The thief was revived with the cleric’s healing. Then we woke it up and Melvin interrogated it in orcish. It didn’t give us any useful info. Also, it seemed to think the word for “Lord” was “Fart” Lopping off a finger didn’t produce any effect except to have a deep rumbling voice from the cave demand we release the monster. Still thinking ogre, and feeling the pain of the battle still, we ran.

Later, in the marsh we discovered a mound above the soggy mess, and investigated it. Once again, our initial thought of barrow mound proved to be incorrect, and we found ourselves fighting lizardmen. Thankfully the entrance to their lair was so small that only one could exit a round. We killed 4 when those within called for parlay. This was probably because while the rest of the group was killing the lizardmen that came out, Melvin was dropping open flasks of oil into the hole. They offered us a bar of gold to go away, so we did.

Unfortunately that was the end of our time…

All in all I had a great time. Peter used a homebrewed travel tracking system, which I thought worked well. The 5 mile hex was divided into both 1 mile hexes and 0.2 mile hexes. We were given a mostly blank hex map with only the main roads, the keep, and the monastery on it. This was my first time doing a hex crawl, and I really liked how it went. I was always a bit unsure about how to run one before, but this made sense, and I can see doing a similar system in the future.

Also, if you’re at all familiar with Keep on the Borderlands, you know that the monsters are almost all found clumped together at the caves of chaos. In Peter’s Expedition to the Borderlands, the lairs are all spread throughout the hex. Honestly I think this is an improvement over Gary’s original.

Other house rules that Peter used were:

• 2 weapon fighting is a single attack roll at +1 to hit
• Sleep gives a saving throw
• 0 HP was down, but not necessarily out, if magical healing can be applied.
• Weapon damage is by class

Lastly, if you note the picture above, Peter used Dyson’s character sheets!