Campaign Log: A World of Mystery. (The Evil Group)

[Extra-Planar]

Hey, I've been DMing since I was a kid. Back in the day I would just get pre-mades, but now I would rather build a world for my players to explore rather than even worry about making a central plot to bind the story around. I've wanted to write down the saga of this Campaign for a long time since it seems to be the first I'll have ran from level 1 to 20. One of the things that I think has made this campaign so fun to play is the group (those poor, stupid, sadistic bastards) they've really sunk to lows I've seldom seen elsewhere in Dnd. Oh well, lets get it on...

The Party: These Brave Souls were the first to set out into the world I made to run, I'm currently running 5 campaigns out of this same world. These guys got it first, I don't envy them.

Adolph Stalin- Half-Orc Barbarian (CE)
Gin Du- Human Monk (LE)
"The Joker"- Human Beguiler (NE)
Rigg Dahn- Elf Fighter (N)

Everyone in the party is male, as are the players.


When the campaign began, I pulled out the map and pointed out where the party was, stating "You and everyone else staying in the common-houses have been cleared out to minimize the impact of the plague in Keeptown. Where do you want to go?" In the end they decided to journey eastwards towards a small farming community called Derkeltown. Having been founded by the intrepid farmer Elias Derkleton, populated almost completely by his descendants and possessing a stink few places can rival, the name seemed appropriate. When this band of upstart warriors rolls into town, they find that the town is populated by idiots and after a beat-down to some overconfident farmhands and a quick chat with the bartender in town, Kenny, the party was off to take over this small town's drug trade.

The Beguiler had managed to get the information out of Kenny Derkleton, and had discovered that a man living on the edge of town, Bobby Clegg, was making moonshine and drugs and selling them through the bar. Being some evil fellows, the party went over to put the squeeze on Bobby. The Beguiler leads the way, trying to convince Bobby that they're only there to buy some drugs, but when he starts to have trouble convincing this guy, he whips out his hand-crossbow and shoots him in the chest!

Big Mistake.

This guy was level three, they were level one. I had everyone roll init, and Bobby the Rogue managed to beat out everyone else in initiative whipped out an alchemist's fire, chucked it in his whiskey still then run off in the resulting explosion. Everyone but the Beguiler made their reflex saves to take half damage from this first blast, but sadly the Beguiler was incinerated by the blast even as Bobby Clegg ran off. The rest of the party looted Bobby's shack, the Barbarian Adolph grabbed some drugs (Agony from BoVD), but in the end they didn't feel like going after Bobby. When they returned to the bar I had the player for "The Joker," who had been killed in the first round of the first encounter of the first session, to roll a Bluff Check. Nat 20! The bar-tender pulled off his face to reveal that the Beguiler had duped Kenny Derkleton to switch places with him and HE had died instead. After looting the bar and gloating about a narrow brush with death, the Beguiler gained a level. They crashed in the bar until the next morning.

Well, the next morning they hear a hell of a fuss. The town guards working under the Sheriff, Hal Derkleton had apprehended Bobby Clegg on suspicion of arson the night before and they were taking him to trial. The whole town practically turned out to see the trial, some because they were out of the drugs Bobby was selling in the first place, some out of boredom, and some were just there to see a hanging. The party was the third kind of spectator, and it wasn't long before all hell broke loose. The Joker told Adolph to give him some of those drugs, seeing a chance to cause chaos, he chucked the stuff into the crowd, who began immediately falling all over one another to scoop up the narcotics. Well, while Rigg Dahn and the Joker were content to just loot while the riot was breaking out, Adolph and Gin were ready to fight. Gin completely outclassed the villagers he was fighting, leaving them incapacitated with just his fists. Adolph, on the other hand, injured a lot of bystanders, leaving one of them dead by his sword. About the same time, the town's leader and law-keeper, Judge Hogg came out of the courthouse and quelled the mob with an authoritative shout. The Judge (Cleric of St. Cuthbert) and his deputies arrested everyone they could catch, so in the end they apprehended some of the villagers and Adolph Stalin, who came without a fight.

In the Jailhouse, the guards were questioning Bobby and guarding the front doors, so when they were alone, Stalin whips out the rest of his Agony and throws some down on the ground in the middle of the cell. Everyone in the cell does them, and goes into a paralysis (as per BoVD effects) and when they came out of that, things began to get sexual quick. Well, Adolph wasn't having it and killed everyone with a bed-pan. Hearing the noise, Judge Hogg bursts in to see what's the matter, sees the drugged raging Half-Orc in the cell with the dead bodies and passes judgement right there. Guilty. He opens the cell-door and swings his Lawful mace for a Smite! That single attack would have brought even raging Stalin to -10, but the Agony in his system kept him on his feet and using his barbarian fast movement he was able to outrun the guards and escape the jail! After he escaped, Adolph came back to the bar, where he found Gin, the Joker, and Rigg counting the money they had looted during the robbery, still a pretty pathetic stash in the sense of the world at large.

Adolph passed out, leveled up, and in the morning the group left town to avoid further repercussions from the law. They had decided to go to a small logger's Hamlet on the edge of the Duke's Wood, Rudy's Holler.

That was pretty much how the first session went, I'll be updating this thread until it's up to the point where we're at currently.

[Extra-Planar]

When we picked up the Party had left Derkeltown and fled the law to a more remote logging village, Rudy's Holler. The group was wounded and disgruntled, with only half of their members in top shape (they had leveled), but they showed up into town without too much fuss, having beaten the news of their crimes to the small village. They had coin and so they were given a place to stay, but it wasn't too long before bloodshed broke out. Gin Du, a ruthless monk, became convinced that by extorting the village for protection money, he would be enforcing his own view of the law. Needless to say, the Sheriff of the town (a Dwarf with a foul temper) thought differently. They fought and Gin killed him, but got jumped by the first of many people seeking to bring him to justice, a Gnoll bounty hunter named Ice.

This Gnoll got the drop on Gin and managed to bloody him in a turn, until Adolph (Half-Orc Barbarian) Stalin attacked the Gnoll. Unfortunately he was completely unsuccessful in his attempts to save his friend. Stalin got tripped and was looking bad, having only landed minimal damage until Gin came up from behind this Gnoll and grappled him. Stalin got back up and the two quickly dispatched Ice. Gin gained a level for the kill, and the two of them became very bored in character, sadly, Rudy's Holler wasn't spared yet.

The Joker (Beguiler) and Rigg Dahn (Elf Archer) were still in the Inn, Rigg went to the general store and then tore the place up looking for some rope or something. It was pretty much senseless violence for it's own sake... Anyways, the Joker proceeds to do some explicit things with some of the logger's daughters in town in a latrine, then went to con the Burgher. Once he entered the Burgher's chambers, the Joker went out of his way to lie his ass off about what they were doing here before he then color sprayed the room when he was ready to make his move. He opened the door and had Rigg spray the room with a rapid shot, more than enough to kill the Burgher (commoner...) the party laid claim to an enchanted axe the Joker saw before burning down the Burgher's house and setting off into the Duke's woods (also illegal, but who's counting at this point).

From there the rest of the session was days upon days of wandering lost through the Duke's Hollow, a forest acquired by the current Duke's grandfather from the Elves of the Emerald Wood after a bitter war. The creatures in the wood were fearsome indeed, but the thing that the party seemed to dread the most was a mysterious horseman that shadowed them through the woods, appearing for the briefest of moments before disappearing back into the woods. The party was paranoid that it might be a bounty hunter who had followed them into the forest, and in the end they kept going deeper in until they came upon a manor sitting in a tree. This was one of many Elven homesteads left behind at the end of the war, too well hidden to be found by just anyone and built by the masterful carpenters of the Elves. The party, tired and spooked of the forest at that moment decided to go into the abandoned tree-house. Inside they found monstrous spiders in sinister webs had overrun the manse, but Rigg Dahn, and elf himself kept finding secret doors and increasing wealth behind the walls of the successive chambers they explored. Finally they came upon a huge spider, and it's webs were deadly to a 2nd level party, the spiders reach was devastating against the party, but in the end it was Rigg Dahn who felled the massive spider. Again they found a secret chamber behind a wall, it was filled with the most wondrous treasure yet, magic items.

The most notable of these powerful items was a fully charged Staff of Healing (a staff of white ash wood). It came with a note to use the power of the staff responsibly and help as many people as possible with it. This note was promptly crumpled up and thrown away. The party rested overnight to regain their strength since no one had leveled on the previous quest, they still needed to get back to civilization before they could sell the magic items and spend the small trove of gold they found in the tree-mansion. Just to keep this in perspective, this staff would have the power to curb the plague in the country's capital, but it fell into the hands of bandits. They set out to try and find their way back from the deep woods they had been journeying in, but encountered more resistance on the way back, including some Ooze and the mysterious horseman. They had just finished off the Ooze when the horseman rode up from the dark shade of the deep underbrush, a fearsome undead horse beneath him to match the headless warrior before them!

The party does alright, but the Headless Rider charged on his horse, bringing his vicious weapon to bare on the party! They fought hard, but in the end they were outmatched... In the end, Gin Du managed to stay alive long enough to have the swordsman drop his blade on a nat 1, then kicked his already damaged mount's head in with a flurry. The Headless Rider got up off the ground and was surrounded by Adolph Stalin who beat into the undead warrior as best he could, and the Joker who finished it with a cure critical wounds from the Staff of Healing. Everyone levels up and they loot the Headless Rider! Gin Du gets what will become his signature weapon, the Stone Cleaver: a +1 Vicious Mighty Cleaving Keen Longsword (ouch for both sides). Adolph picks up the Rider's full-plate in addition to the axe of the Burgher of Rudy's Holler, and a mythril shield he had found in the abandoned elf-home. The Joker even got a cloak of resistance +1, so he couldn't complain too much. In the end it was Rigg who got shafted, and the rest of the Journey out of the woods was uneventful. The Party made it back to Rudy's Holler two days after initially arriving there.

The dirt-bags got some magic items and lived by the skin of their teeth, but will their luck last? Continued next time...

[Extra-Planar]

As we started this third session, I needed to find a way to bring in another character who was trying to join the group, I feel like it went smoothly enough, but mainly with this session I wanted the party to know their actions would have consequences as the game progressed. You'll see how that went.

Once again the party is:
Gin Du, Human Monk/Fighter
Adolph Stalin, Half-Orc Barbarian
The Joker, Human Beguiler
Rigg Dahn, Elf Fighter

No healing, no fireballs, oh well.

When the party arrived back at the village Rudy's Holler, they seemed to have forgotten the fact that they murdered the sheriff and burned down their Burgher's house. What they couldn't have known is that the village sent a call for help out two days ago to the best law man in the Duchy. No one saw this coming however, so their reactions were pretty standard based on their characters... The Joker was busy screwing some wenches while Gin, Adolph and Rigg drank down in the bar. Eventually they heard the sound of thunder, this prompted the Joker to make a spot check which only revealed that there was hardly a cloud in the sky. He went back to screwing, but eventually Gin went out front to take a piss.

The thunder was caused by the hooves of what I had affectionately called the "Super-Posse" while I was getting the ideas together. It consisted of every Sheriff remaining throughout the Duchy. They had pulled together a crew of Bad-ass's including Judge Hogg of Derkeltown (lvl. 5 Cleric of St. Cuthbert), Sheriff Hal Derkelton (lvl. 3 Fighter), Sheriff T'challa of Barunga a town to the west of the Duchy (lvl. 3 Ranger), Rake-mon a renowned bounty hunter (lvl. 3 Half-orc Barbarian) and even Sir Lafource, a famous Knight who serves the duke (Lvl. 4 Dwarven Knight w/ Rhino mount), as if this wasn't enough they had gotten one of the best trackers in the Duchy, Laird Baldimore (Elf Scout lvl. 5). I had this posse run into the final PC on the road to Rudy's Holler, a Psion called Quincy, he agreed to accompany them to further his psychological research.

The party was out-leveled, out-manned and both sides had numerous magic items. I had thought that the party would try and escape, I was going to use this "Super Posse" to drive the plot and keep the characters on the move and away from civilization (where all the best adventures invariably take place). This didn't happen.

When Gin saw that there was a group of horsemen riding hard into town, he yelled out a warning to the rest of the group, who jumped into action. Rigg Dahn ran out the back door to keep an eye out for trouble as the Joker came down into the back room of the Inn. At the same time, Adolph Stalin joined Gin out in the street in front of the Inn.

Rigg saw some horsemen ride up as one of them shot a bow at him, hitting him in the shoulder! He stumbled back into the Inn as the Joker began to edge towards the door into the front room. The Judge came through the door, followed by Sheriff T'challa and his dual wielded longswords. Rigg only just escaped thanks to a nat 1 on an attack roll by the judge and the Joker's clever use of a grease spell.

Out front, it was the two front-line fighters versus Hal Derkelton, Sheriff of Derkeltown and Rake-mon, a fearsome bounty hunter. They were doing alright, until they felt a rumbling behind them. Gin did well at Init, and made a last second reflex save to avoid being impaled by the charge of Lafource's war Rhino! Instead, it was Hal Derkelton who received a horn to the gut before being flung upon the roof of a nearby house (dead). Adolph and Rake-mon fought back and forth without either gaining an advantage over the other, then Gin pulled out his Stone Cleaver and buried it into the Rhino's head (Crit)! Lafource made his reflex to roll to his feet and Rake-mon managed to drop Adolph unconscious with a crit. He made his way over to flank Gin, hoping the wrap this up quickly, but the Monk would not be denied and managed to stay fighting despite incredible odds.

At about this moment, the Joker came out the front door of the Inn and one Use Magic Device check later he had revived Adolph with the Staff of Healing. Rigg came out afterwards and tried unsuccessfully to cover the door of the Inn. He missed T'challa, who tumbled next to him and stabbed him in his side! Gin power-attacked and was rewarded with a mighty cleave from Dwarf to Half-orc, dropping both of them in one fell swing! Adolph got up and was dropped by an attack of opportunity from the Judge's Lawful mace. The Joker healed him one more time before running off, yelling for everyone else to retreat too. Rigg continued to struggle against T'challa, and Adolph was knocked down again by the Judge, who was preparing to Coup de'Grace him. Gin dispatched T'challa by stabbing him in the back, then turned to face Judge Hogg.

At that point, the Joker cast sleep from a hiding spot in an alleyway, the Judge failed with a nat 2, and he was suddenly at the mercy of the Party! I hadn't intended for them to win this fight, but I was excited that they had pretty much won it. The next turn, the Joker slit Judge Hogg's throat before bringing Adolph back from negatives. At this point, Quincy came forward and revealed that one of the Posse was getting away, Laird Baldimore was indeed retreating to enlist more help. Rigg put a quick stop to this by hitting a miracle nat 20 on Laird's horse. Gin Du then chased down the tracker and put him to the sword.

In the end, they decided not to kill Quincy, and he convinced them to allow him to accompany them (so he can study their aberrant criminal psyches). Besides getting a new Party member, the group gained a number of magic items: Gin got Judge Hogg's Lawful Mace, The Joker made sure to loot his Necklace of Fireballs, Rigg got Laird's bow and so on. At this point, the party was pissed... They decided they were bored of this woodsman's village and decided to go back to the now unprotected Derkeltown.

They went back and indeed found that it was unprotected. After burning it down and committing some atrocities I can't really mention in good taste here, the party "had their revenge" as well as everything of value the farmer's had. They decided that since they were no doubt very wanted at this point they would make their way down to the border of the Duchy they were in towards the neighboring nation to the south, The Calliphate of Calliban.