Session 1: The Death of Kram

The massive, corrupted beastman hit the damp cavern floor with a dull thud which echoed down the dark passages. Its head lay a few feet away, cleaved from its twisted body by a powerful blow from Barry's bastard sword. Ser Thaddeus stowed his warhammer and inspected the unmoving body of Kram Swifthorn. The dwarf's skull had been crushed by the monsters' massive, clawed hand moments before, and there was nothing else that could be done for him. Kram was the first to fall in this savage grotto.

 

Larry Elmore

Session #1

This is the second campaign diary for my Valakis campaign (hence the name of this blog!). While my previous post recounts the events of a pre-campaign adventure, this campaign diary is a synopsis of our first session of play using the Old School Essentials ruleset.

The Adventurers

The campaign is beginning with four players, each of whom rolled their stats in the traditional 3d6 in ability score order method. I did allow my players to swap a set of stats, so that they would be able to play the class they were hoping to play. It should be noted that I do use a house rule where characters start with max HP from their first level's hit dice. 

Player Characters

	Barry [Human Barbarian 1] 11 HP (STR 16, INT 10, WIS 10, DEX 12, CON 15, CHA 11)
	Osiris [Elf Magic User 1] 2 HP (STR 11, INT 18, WIS 8, DEX 14, CON 4, CHA 9)
	Thaddeus [Human Paladin 1] 8 HP (STR 16, INT 9, WIS 16, DEX 5, CON 11, CHA 13)
	Venali [Elf Thief 1] 4 HP (STR 9, INT 12, WIS 10, DEX 13, CON 9, CHA 11)

Setting the Scene

I began the campaign with the party already being relatively familiar with each other, beyond Barry & Thaddeus' adventure in the Forgotten Shrine. I set the opening scene by reading the following to the players. How better to start an old school style campaign of a Dungeons & Dragons retro-clone than with a dragon attack?

"Escorting a merchant caravan. Easy money. Just follow the old, merchant road for half a moon cycle until you reach Halesport. Don’t ask questions, scare off the occasional bear and everyone collects a fat coin purse. Whatever Fat Tobin, the portly merchant who had hired you, was looking to trade must have been worth a jarl’s ransom. You don’t hire 12 sellswords unless you’ve got something worth protecting. 
 

Barry was on lookout at the front of the column and was the first to spot it. To his credit, Barry did his job and announced the dragon’s presence before he dove into the nearby pond to elude the dragonfire. 
 

Thaddeus should have been butchered in his saddle. Thanks to years of training, divine protection, or sheer dumb luck, he was thrown from his saddle as the beast snatched his horse and used its entrails to string the nearby trees with a grisly garland. 
 

Venali was riding in a wagon near the rear of the convoy. She watched as the dragon incinerated five of her fellow sellswords in an instant. Acting on instinct, the elf thief threw herself off the wagon only a moment before the beast threw the wagon, ox still attached, through the air. The wagon slammed into a nearby tree, shattering the various crates and pots across the forest floor. 
 

Osiris had been busy discussing the finer aspects of herbal remedies with Fat Tobin when the shouting began. The elf mage hardly had time to make sense of the chaos around him before he was sent flying into a nearby brook, where he landed with an unceremonious plop. Better to be muddy and bruised than to be poor Tobin, though. The last anyone heard of the fat bastard was his screaming as the dragon carried him off along with the wagon filled with fine samite and strange bobbles from the Utter East. The wyrm probably spotted all those gaudy rings."

Anato Finnstark

Off We Go

After realizing that they were the only survivors of the dragon attack, the party did a quick search of the area for anything of worth. The dragonfire had incinerated the other caravan guards, leaving little more than charred bone. I made mention that one of the other mercenaries had bragged about his magic dagger, but when the players searched for it, they realized that in OSE, even magic item have a chance of being destroyed by suitably powerful attacks, such as breath attacks or magic.

Being the only character from the region, Ser Thaddeus mentioned to the group that he believed there should be a village further west along the road. The group gathered their things and walked along the muddy cart path for a few hours. Passing several small hamlets, they eventually arrived at the village of Romworth on the western shore of a large lake, known as the Bythe Mere. The village was fortified by a 3' earthen rise capped with a 6' wooden palisade. From outside the walls they could see the village's motte and bailey fort. Thaddeus suggested that the group go talk to the local authority, likely a knight or reeve who rules the town under authority of the local freeholding baron.

a motte and bailey keep

The group passed through the village, the elves gathering a few odd glances. As they passed through the center of the village, they noted that there was a single stone church of the Holy Chantry, the organized religion to the moon goddess Renna. Barry also spotted a small stone shrine on the green. Upon inspection, the barbarian realized it was a pagan shrine to a Duvari god of wanderers, which he found appropriate. The group then headed to the northern end of the village and arrived at the main gate of the bailey. Two bored militiamen were standing guard and inquired as to the group's business. When the group informed them of the dragon attack, one of the guards hurried off to find the reeve. 

Conversation with the Reeve

Reeve Warik of Romworth

The guard returned with Reeve Warik, an old solider who served in the baron's personal retinue for many years, in short order. A brief discussion with the reeve revealed that he was aware of the existence of the dragon, but he was still alarmed by the attack. Warik informed the party that the only dragon in the area was a red dragon that keeps its lair in the Skyspire Mountains to the north and this attack should be well outside the dragon's normal range. 

He then informed the party that he had other concerns at the moment, primarily dead and missing villagers from attacks on some of the outlying farms south of Romworth, and he had just dispatched a villager to the local adventuring tavern, the Wand and Axe, to post a bounty decreed by Baron Horik. The party immediately took to this news and inquired about the bounty: 250 silver coins per monster head returned to the reeve or taken to Castle Agen, the baron's fortress located half a day's travel to the west.

Though the bounty was for any monster heads, of chief concern were those responsible for the attacks on the southern homesteaders. According to survivors, the attackers came at night, bearing axe and fire. They walked like men, but roared, moaned and bleated in the night. Several homes had been burned down in the attacks in addition to the dead or missing farmers.

The Wand & Axe

Departing from the bailey, the party headed to the village green, where they had spotted the local inn, the Lakeside Inn, as well as the villages two taverns, the Wand & Axe (the local adventurer's watering hole) and Norman's Taphouse (frequented by the locals). A notice board inside the Wand & Axe held several postings, among them the newly posted monster head bounty. The one-room tavern had a variety of patrons, some of which appeared to be other professional adventurers. There were also several local villagers looking for work as sellswords or as lesser retainers (porters, torch bearers, etc).

While buying a round for his friends, Barry conversed with the tavern keeper, a one-eyed human named Wymar who warned him not to make any trouble, who provided them with some further rumors about the local area. Wymar informed them that based on the location of the attacks, he wondered if the monsters might have moved into an old bandit hideout south of the Bythe Meer. The reeve had managed to catch the bandits during an ambush and had the lot hung a few years ago. One of the younger bandits attempted to bargain for his life by offering to show the reeve their hideout, but Warik just wanted the business done.

The group also talked to the other patrons, holding several impromptu interviews before choosing to hire two men-at-arms and a peasant to act as torch bearer for their upcoming adventure. Before leaving, Osiris privately hired the only dwarf patron in the tavern as a personal bodyguard at a rate of 10sp per day.

The Retainers

	Beatriz, Peasant Torchbearer
	Chucho, Man-at-Arms [lvl 0] Crossbow & Chainmail
	Maynord, Man-at-Arms [lvl 0] Mace & Leather armor
	Kram Swifthorn, Dwarf [lvl 1] Mace, Leather armor & Shield

The Burned Hamlet

New hirelings in tow, the party headed out towards the site of the attacks south of Romworth. Following the road, they reached the outermost hamlets near sundown. After a brief discussion with a farmer named Clive who was heading to Romworth to spend the night behind the walls, they decided to setup an ambush in the night for whatever had been attacking these farms. Barry hid in a bush (and fell asleep on guard duty), Thaddeus sat near a campfire to act as bait, Venali hid in the shell of a burned out farmhouse, and Osiris and the retainers hid in an untouched home, sleeping in shifts.

The night passed without incident (I decided there were 2 in 6 odds the monsters would attack again that night) and the adventurers decided to let Thaddeus and Venali sleep until noon in order to avoid penalties for not resting. Barry spent the morning looking for tracks or other signs of monstrous activity and was able to find the tracks of abnormally large, hooved creatures. The trail led off into the Hartwood, the vast forest south of Romworth. The same forest where they had been attacked by the dragon the previous day.

Following the tracks, Barry led the group through the Hartwood to a large pond which was located roughly a mile south of the Bythe Meer. Searching around the pond, the group found that the pond drained into an underground cavern, and west of the pond, a natural cave entrance surrounded by boulders led into the earth. Around the mouth of the cave they found many hoof prints, as well as discarded animal carcasses, scraps of leather and broken weapons.

Adrien Fournier-Mckoy

The Grotto

The group established a marching order (primarily designed to protect the mage) and followed a worked staircase down into the cave, heading east. Their torchlight quickly revealed the presence of two large guard dogs, which Ser Thaddeus distracted by throwing some dried meat further into the cavern. At this point, they realized the cavern diverged into three paths, north, east and south. 

Barry and Venali checked the small norther alcove first, where they found the walls smeared with grime. The scent of rotting meat filled the air, and a crude, 7' stone statue with demonic, caprine features stood along the north wall. The room was lit by a small fire located in the statue's open torso. The pair searched the room and discovered charred human hands in the cavity of the statue, apparently an offering to this dark figure. Using his sword to examine the hands, Barry noticed one of the hands still bore a jeweled ring. Starting strong!

Turning their attention to the southern passage, the group headed into what appeared to be a former storage room of the bandits that once used this space as a hideout. Searching the room, the group quickly realized the crates were all broken and the barrels empty. This room too diverged into eastern and southern passages, and the party chose to take the eastern passage.

Following the tunnel down, it eventually opened up into another small room where they found 3 humans bound and gagged in a corner. The party quickly freed the captives of their bonds. One of the prisoners turned out to be Kormak, the squire to Ser Torwald. The party had heard that Torwald was missing and now presumed the knight was very dead.

While Barry and Venali held this quiet conversation, Osiris attempted to look down one of the two tunnels leading from this room using his Infravision. Much to his dismay, the elf spotted the body shape of a large, bestial figure, which also spotted him. The beast let out a loud bellow and charged down the hallway at the mage, who quickly retreated behind his armored compatriots.

A Deadly Encounter

As the beast charged, Venali attempted to hide herself along the rock wall, while Barry and Kram, the two warriors closest to the tunnel, formed a shield wall to prevent the beast from reaching anyone else. The party was horrified when they discovered that this beast was not a Weregoat, their going theory on what was causing the attacks, and instead now were face to face with a huge, bestial humanoid with large horns, caprine facial features, two massive claws and a scorpion tail!

The fighting was frantic, and the beast quickly landed two claw strikes on Kram, who went down in a heap. Barry was forced to sacrifice his shield to avoid being stabbed by the beast's barbed stinger and Venali was able to dodge being impaled several times, but the creature proved extremely difficult to bring down.

In a shocking moment for the players, the beast did not simply leave Kram unconscious on the cavern floor. Reaching down with one of its massive claws, it shattered the poor dwarf's head, killing him. At this point, with no shield remaining, Barry grabbed his bastard sword with two hands and decapitated the beast.

As it was getting late, we ended the session here with the party standing over the corpse of a foul monster and their fallen comrade.

Marta Dettlaff

Final Thoughts

What a first session! The players really seemed to take to not only the system, but also the game world as I started describing it to them. I have spend the past few weeks working rather feverishly on fleshing out this campaign setting to allow for a sandbox style game. It felt really rewarding to see the players engage with it in the way they did so quickly.

To me, the biggest hurdle for moving from 5th edition D&D to an OSR style game is removal of most rolls for determining what happens outside of combat. The group seemed to have embraced that more "hands on" approach that the system requires, with a few small suggestions or reminders from me here and there.

I was happy to see them decide so quick to find the reeve and begin to dive into the power structure in the Barony of Highmark, where they currently find themselves. I'm also glad we ran a "pre-campaign" session with Barry & Thaddeus so that I could get them used to the idea of retainers. They didn't hesitate for a moment about heading to the Wand & Axe to look for new retainers to hire. Obviously, last week's session left an impression on them.

Next week our brave heroes delve deeper into "the Roaring Grotto" to face whatever evils lurk therein. Rest in peace Kram, and until next time...

Onward to Adventure!