The Slavers’ Cove

While Sebastian recovers from filth fever, Ransook rounds up some old and new friends.  The old: Xander (now an eladrin wizard) and Willow (still a half-elf cleric).  The new: Nik (a half-elf ranger and a replacement for Hanthel), Delilah (a dragonborn paladin and replacement for Violet) and an unamed tiefling warlock (a last-minute replacement for Hammer, whose player showed up unexpectedly).

Together the group heads back to the old mansion and uses the lantern to signal whomever was out on the lake.  In a short while a longboat with two human and two halfling slavers show up, and the group summarily dispatches them.  One of the humans was spared, and after a brief interrogation reveals that there is a slaving ring operating off the island.

Following the interrogation, there was a dispute between Ransook, who had promised liberty to the captive if he gave them information, and Nik and the warlock who wanted to either kill or severally cripple the slaver to insure that he wouldn’t cause trouble.  This conflict continues until Delilah and Willow sided with Ransook and the pirate was bound and stashed in a closet in the house.

The group then took the slavers’ longboat and headed towards the lagoon on the far side of the island (using two dead halflings to complete the disguise).  The PC’s then overran the slavers’ ship that was docked there, pulled up the gangplank and then used it as a platform for attacking the pirates coming out the their hideout in the cove.  During the combat a few of the melee-oriented PC’s jumped to the dock; Delilah missed the dock, however, and sank to the bottom of the lagoon (she was fished out, nearly drowned, after the encounter).

So far the (new) Strange Quests crew had managed a pretty easy time of it, but this was to end.  The inner sanctum of the slavers proved to almost be their undoing.  The lead slaver, a human wizard, was protected by two guardian drakes and two bodyguards who managed to overcome both Delilah and the warlock, and deal out a great deal of damage before finally falling.  After this brutal battle, the PC’s were shocked to discover yet another chamber, one holding a very young white dragon!  Xander somehow managed to render it unconscious with a sleep spell, and the other PC’s gang-piled on it (using those once-a-day powers) and kill it before it could do too much damage.

Within the frozen lake, the tiefling warlock discovered the dragon’s meager hoard.

Having defeated the slavers and rescued several local townspeople, the heroes slowly manage to get the slavers’ ship back to Silverton, where the Lord Sheriff (after some vacillating) finally agreed to recognize it as “spoils of war” for the PC’s.  A few questions remain:

• who are the mysterious tribes of minotaurs that were receiving the shipments of slaves, and why?
• why is there a young dragon living amongst the slavers?  Pet?  Mastermind?
• what will the PC’s do with a ship they can barely sail?
• where will the SQ crew go next?

DM’s Notes:

This adventure was all about battlefield control.  When the PC’s could control the field, they did very well.  In the encounter with the slaver boss, the NPC’s controlled the field, separating their defender and one of the strikers from the group while at the same time keeping the other two strikers and the leader from being effective.  The group still needs to learn how to work a large area without getting “bunched up” in places like doorways (now that we are no longer allowing PC’s to move through each other’s squares like we did in C&C).

The Secret of the Old Mansion

CK’s Note: we had a campaign “reset” when we switched to a new ruleset “Heroes & Horrors.”  In the reset, we dropped the quest for the twelve relics and the Grimfeast locale.  At the first session only one player ended up making it (everyone else had some last-minute things come up).  As a result, the player ran two PC’s.

Ransook and his brother, a cleric named Sebastian, had bought passage on a ship traveling to the city of Silverton, located in the Silvershire region.  Ransook had heard that the region was ripe for fortune seeking adventurers: decaying ruins, old silver mines, and not a lot in the way of civilization.  While passing through Lake Lodun, Ransook notices a run down manse on the shores of the lake.  In the upper window is a flickering light, flashing in what appears to be some sort of signal.

After checking into the local inn, “The Old Bag of Nails,” Ransook and Sebastian follow the lakeshore to investigate the reputedly abandoned estate.  After scaling the walls, they encounter large scorpions prowling the grounds, goblins running about the rooms, and two human skeletons sealed up in the dining room.  They also find the goblin’s leader, a Hexer, who has a signal lamp and some basic instructions.  From the upper room they can see an island out in the middle of the lake.  Who could they be contacting?

Below the house, the brothers also find a boat (and some dire rats who give Sebastian a nasty disease) and a bunch of shackles.  The brothers head back to Silverton to plan their next move.