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SilverLeaf167
2010-07-14, 05:14 AM
So, I just discovered the concept of campaign journals, and decided to try and make one myself. This is my first completely self-made campaign and I am not that experienced of a DM, so just post constructive criticism if something looks stupid. I'll appreciate any good tips.

The Characters
Regel the Dwarven Barbarian (CN). Was originally a human, but we did a swap thingy. High strength and constitution, but low intelligence and charisma. Carries a dwarven waraxe and a morningstar. Johan's brother IRL, 9 years old.
Sheet (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=224135)

Johan the Human Rogue (CN). Kidnapped by ninjas as a baby, but escaped later and reunited with his little brother, Fred. Sometimes kind of annoying (see first session). A skill monkey who uses a light crossbow, dual daggers and a rapier. Regel's brother IRL.
Sheet (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=224131)

Aramil the Elven Wizard (N). A mysterious, quiet elf, apparently authistic. Hasn't done much anything so far. Specialized in Evocation, barred Necromancy and Illusion. His player has a tendency for reading instead of concentrating on the game. Carries a quarterstaff and a longbow.
Sheet (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=220414)


Feyralon the Elven Druid (LN). A DMPC who participated only on the first session. His animal companion is an alsatian riding dog. Tries to avoid combat. Growls at people he doesn't like. Wields a scimitar and a longbow.
Sheet (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=220408)
The World
Ringland, despite it's name, is shaped like a disk. The disk has two large continents, Hearth and Hairiku, and multiple smaller islands. The name Ringland comes from the humongous ring ("Overring") that goes around the disk, directly above when viewed from the middle of the disk.

On the opposite inner sides of the disk are the Sun and the Moon, and because of this a tropical zone is located under the ring. As the Moon glows its own light, all nights are full Moons, making lycanthropes more dangerous. Months and years are only counted as time, not something orbiting around something. For a mysterious reason, once per year the disk stops, leaving the Moon on the sky for approximately a month. This period of time is called the Longmoon, and during it a massive celebration called the Shadow Festival goes on around the world. Lycanthropes stay in their feral state for this full time.
Races
Large cities are mostly inhabited by humans and gnomes. Halflings keep the farms around the cities, elfs live in the forests and dwarves have secluded themselves in the mountains. Half-orcs are rare, but some are encountered in human societies near orcs. Some other humanoid races of lesser population may sometimes be encountered.
Subraces
Hill/Road Gnomes
Most gnomes are members of either of these two subraces:
Hill Gnomes are the wizard/alchemist/mechanic kind of gnome. They prefer living in a single place, researching new technology and magic in peace. Most societies want them to live slightly outside the community, as the constant explosions are sort of disturbing to some people.
+2 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom, -2 Strength, favored class Wizard
Road Gnomes are usually traveling merchants and bards, rarely staying in one place for a long time and greatly appreciating a change of routine or environment. Like other gnomes, they have an innate gift for magic, but invoke it through bardic music rather than musty spellbooks and incantations.
+2 Charisma, +2 Wisdom, -2 Strength, favored class Bard
Technology
Most of the world uses the basic technology setting for D&D. However, gnomes have discovered some steam, clockwork and air pressure technology, along with basic explosives, which are used both for weapons and for supplementary utilities.
Houserules

To speed up progression, ability points are given every three levels (3, 6, 9 etc.)
I always forget to split up EXP between the players, so it isn't split at all.
Writing level-granted spells into a spellbook doesn't have a cost.

SilverLeaf167
2010-07-14, 05:32 AM
Session 0: The Pilot of DOOM
This session used a different setting, and everything that happened during this was forgotten and ignored for reasons you'll propably understand by reading.

Johan and Fred have come to a small city called Hillgate. They are very hungry after their travels and wind up in a tavern called the Red Leaf. They both order steaks and fried potatoes, as those are the only things served there, and go wait for their food. In the meantime, the Druid and Wizard arrive, repeat ordering sequence. After finishing their meals, Fred and Johan leave. Outside, Fred starts choking a random stranger in the street, but Johan gets him to stop. The Wizard has fallen asleep on his food, but the Druid goes out to see what is happening. Johan and Fred are arguing, and the Druid tries to call them down with an unsuccessful Flare. Guards arrive and the Druid steps back. After Johan has tried Disguising and Bluffing to free Fred from the guards, he simply kicks a guard's ankle and runs away with Fred.

A crazy chase lasting about an hour follows. During the chase, Fred robs a gay barber. The chase ends when the guards are distracted by an old man falling over.

All the players get to an inn. J&F stay in one room, F stays in another and A in another. When Fred starts making a great big ruckus in the hallway, the Druid's dog starts barking. Fred thrusts his greatsword through the door and it goes through the dog's head. The Druid is understandably pissed and tries to kill Fred with the few offensive spells he has. They end up getting kicked out from the inn. Johan takes Fred's sword, so he goes to rob a weapon store. The paranoid storekeeper survives, thanks to a Sanctuary spell.

At this point, we started telling Fred that maybe he should stop fooling around and that he's just wasting time. He starts crying and after 15 minutes Johan has calmed him down. We agree to skip straight to the adventure and forget everything that happened.

The adventure I had prepared wasn't all that creative, even in my opinion, and was just meant to create a basis for the next quest, which never was. Anyhow, the players met a gnome weapon merchant in a tavern. The weapon merchant told them that someone had smuggled monstrous spiders into his warehouse inside a large crate, and now he couldn't go in. The PCs agreed quite easily, as everyone was already tired and the mood was kind of low.

While the others entered the infested warehouse, Johan succeeded on the DC 25 Climb check to get to the roof. Inside, the Druid got bitten by a sneaky tiny spider, which got killed pretty quick, without even poisoning anybody. Some more spiders jumped down. For a while, nobody hit anything, but when the PCs started hitting the spiders the fight ended quite fast. As they progressed in the warehouse, Fred got stuck in a giant web, and by struggling got entangled even worse. A medium monstrous spider started progressing towards the trapped Fighter. Johan made a hole in the weak ceiling and started raining bolts on the spider. This battle was pretty short, too. Around the corner the players were ambushed by some small spiders (see, I told it was creative). Another short battle which nothing special, Johan was still on the roof. And the final boss was, guess what, a LARGE monstrous spider! Johan finally jumped down from the roof and started fighting the spider. The others quickly arrived, defeating the spider and leaving the now-safe warehouse. They met the gnome merchant, who gave them some gold (a bag of 1000 gp or sumthing).

Side Notes
- Johan spent almost all the time shooting through the roof at the helpless spiders. It also reflects his over-all playing style pretty well. I guess it's logical for a rogue.
- We had two spellcasters, but not a single spell was cast during the actual adventure. The Druid used a scimitar and the Wizard used a longbow.

END OF SESSION
Between this and the new session, I thought that I wanted to use a new, more original setting, and everyone agreed to it. Next time we play, we will use the new setting, which is the one described in the first post.
Goblin Siege
[SPOILER]Fred wanted to become a dwarven barbarian, and because we were kind of starting over anyway, I allowed it.

The players agreed on the default explanation for becoming a team: they met somewhere and decided to go adventuring together. To make things easier, I simply said that they were wandering randomly in a forest, walking on a wagon road. They soon arrived at a large, open area with a village in it. Right next to them was a lonely house with some weird holes in the roof. For some reason, Regel decided to climb up on the roof and look through a hole. He saw a gnome doing something on top of a desk. Regel tried to go through the hole and got stuck. With perfect timing, something exploded inside the house and smoke filled it up, slowly flowing out from the holes.

The gnome opened the door, almost hitting Johan (who was picking the lock) in the face. Johan explained that his "little friend" had gotten stuck in the hole. The gnome started pushing Regel out with a large stick, eventually succeeding. Johan (who has obviously become the party face) thanked the gnome for help and found out something about the gnome. His name is Maxie Wobbletop, and he is an alchemist and a mechanic. His brother Welly was currently using giant bellows to get the smoke out.

The players continued to explore the quite tiny village. They met a blacksmith, an equipment salesman with a French accent and a gnome banker. Johan haggled with all of them, with moderate success. For some reason, Regel stole a bucket from a well. With an easy Gather Information check, Johan heard that the village is surrounded by a very large amount of goblins that let any unthreatening travelers inside the village but nobody out, to minimize the risk of outsiders discovering the situation. Johan (a minor) decided to drink some Barleer (beer made from "morning barley") before going to sleep.

In the morning, the trio was woken up by some cries for help, coming from the alchemist gnomes' house. They found Maxie, who told them that Welly had been kidnapped by goblins. As the players promised to save Welly, Maxie gave them some alchemical items, including some alchemist's fire and a tanglefoot bag.

The player's started walking on the road in the forest, as that was where Welly had probably been taken. Johan spots a goblin sitting in a tree and fires at with his crossbow. He misses, and the goblin jumps down, failing an attack with it's spear and dying in a single round. With its last breath it screams for help in Goblin, and soon two wolf-riding goblins arrive. This battle takes some time, with Johan dealing most of the damage with flank-sneaks and Aramil using a few of his offensive spells. After the battle is over, they see a piece of leather wrapped around a tree, with similar pieces every twenty meters into the forest. They follow the pieces and find themselves in a quiet camp with a campfire and three tents. Inside the tents they find a fried moose leg (yummy!), a smokestick and some blood-red gems. Regel was the one finding the gems, and a short hassle about the distribution of the loot follows. They agree on 33% each.

Johan is checking the woods around the tents while Regel and Aramil are still inside on of the tents. A band of goblin warriors, along with a single adept, arrive and group up at the door of the tent the two players are in. Johan manages to Hide and gets a sneak attack at one of the goblins, killing him. Inside the tent, Aramil casts Enlarge Person on Regel, who blocks the goblins from attacking Aramil and kills them in single sweeps. All the goblin warriors are killed this way, and the frightened adept uses Ghost Sound to fake a great beast coming from another direction while he runs away. Johan manages to kill the adept, the whole party apparently forgetting about the noises.

LAZY RIGHT NOW, TO BE CONTINUED

Lord Loss
2010-07-14, 10:00 AM
I'm exited to see the actual first session. I quite. you may want to put more detail in your descriptions of adventures. I like gnomes, so gnomes being a main race is a big plus for me.

SilverLeaf167
2010-07-14, 10:20 AM
Yes, I will put in more detail. That session was just so boring and crazy that everyone was pretty tired in the end, and I don't remember many details. I guess I could add something...

For the gnomes, I have two subraces. I'll add them to the first post.

EDIT: There. I described the adventure in some more detail. I'm not going to bother to describe the chase. They just ran around randomly. All that I remember is the gay barber part. He actually worked as a distraction, as he started trying to verge one of the guards, who was terrified and jumped out through a window.

SilverLeaf167
2010-07-23, 07:22 AM
Even though a full world was very vast, it would have been very hard to DM and to control the player's movements. Thus, the world is now a disk. Don't worry, the Ring stays.

Some other fluffy changes to the world also done.