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View Full Version : A DM's Tale: Of Poisons and Paladins



Oroboros
2015-05-14, 10:42 AM
I feel the need to share this story with the forums for two primary reasons. One is to serve as a warning to other Dungeon Masters, lest they underestimate the power of a clever and/or lucky PC. The other reason is simply because this was SO DAMN AWESOME. Anyways, on with the story. I wanted to do a campaign with sort of a dark feel, so I thought I would start by wiping out most of the party and forcing them to rebuild with the NPC survivors. The classic way of going about this is an orc horde. One of them has just been driven out of the Worldfang Mountains by an unknown force, and is on route to the peaceful town of Oakville as the story begins. The PCs consist of a human wizard Codias Grendelson, a half-orc paladin Jack Bane, the wandering bard Frastus Rastiff, and Jack Bane’s pet/minion/best friend, the goblin rogue affectionately called Bugger.

The game starts when, in the middle of the town harvest festival, a Yeoman by the name of Thurias stumbles into the town, bruised and bloodied. He claimed that a horde of dozens and dozens of Orcs had recently razed his home to the ground and killed his family. If they continued on their warpath, they would encounter Oakville soon. This caused a massive panic in the village, and scouts were sent out to confirm the threat. Another man was sent to alert the royal army of Fereset, but the townspeople know that by the time the Royal Legion mobilizes, it will be too late for the town. Luckily for Oakville, four heroes spring into action. The town has about 50 men who, at some point or another, had served in the Legion. (These men are all NPC warriors 1-2). The PCs meet and quickly befriend each other during the town’s preparations for war. I leave it to the players to decide how they want to fortify the town, but I warn them that they only have about 2 days to do it. They decide to set up a barricade in the main square, and hide all of the town populace in the Mayor’s mansion. Mayor Alvernias (Aristocrat 2) balks at the idea of having all of those “filthy peasants in my magnificent abode, stealing my fine wines and dirtying my floors”. Frastus has to do some quick-talking to get the mayor to cooperate, and even at the end it takes being threatened by Codias Grendelson and his two apprentices, the Ellsworth twins (Adept 1s) in order to get Alvernias to comply. The PCs know that they have made an enemy of Alvernias, but if they live long enough to worry about it they will be happy. The preparations consist of melting down as much spare metal as possible into armor and weapons. Again, Frastus proves key here in convincing the crowd to give up their pots and pans. By the second day, with about 30 villagers cooperatively crafting, most of the veterans have at least makeshift weapons and armor. As far as fortifications go, the central square has two entrances completely sealed off by wooden spiked walls, and the third entrance with a narrow opening filled with caltrops. The plan is to station the village’s meager group of about 15 archers, along with the four arcanists (Grendelson, Frastus, and the twins) on the rooftops. From there, they will (try to) keep orcs from scaling the barricades. The veterans will form the “front line” around the opening, which in game terms is one square wide filled with caltrops. These veterans include Jack Bane, who has told little Bugger to hide during the fight. Bugger, of course, secretly refuses to abandon his “big guy” to the Orcs, and is hiding under a loose cobblestone that he dug up near the entrance of the barricade, planning on stabbing some Orc toes.

The next day, the party was in for an unpleasant shock as over 600 Orcs come marching out of the woods. Mixed in and among these Orcs, who are mostly warrior 1s, are 60 3rd level sergeants, 30 5th level lieutenants, and 20 7th level commanders. Their leader is lv 10 fighter half fiendish orc warlord named Raznark. They charge the town as soon as they see it. At this point, I assumed that the townspeople would be swiftly overrun and butchered. How wrong I was. My first mistake was having the Raznark take point. He charged into the town and the front of the horde, rushing for the gap in the barricade. I wanted to be sure that he didn’t die, so I fiddled with NPC wealth by level a bit. By a bit, I mean +3 full plate and +4 bracers of armor, as well as a belt of physical might +4 (strength and constitution). He only had a non-magical great sword, though, because I still had SOME sense of what was fair. My second mistake, then, was having him step on the square where Bugger was hiding. This is where everything went wrong. I had allowed Bugger access to any poison he wanted before the game, and he chose drow poison. This nifty little concoction is a DC 13 save in order to avoid falling unconscious. I didn’t see the harm at the time, so I let him buy it as part of his starting gear. Bugger quickly applied the poison to his weapon, threw off the cobblestone, and shanked Raznark in the foot. I was confident that the attack would fail to do something. Bugger rolls the dice. 20. I was shocked. He failed to confirm the critical, but Raznark still had to take the fortitude save for the poison. He would have to roll pretty poorly to fail a DC 13 check with +9 to fortitude saves, right? 2. He rolled a 2. Raznark stumbles, and then falls unconscious. Jack Bane quickly jumps in and does a Coup de Gras. He drags off the body, and dons the enchanted armor, bracers, and belt. What follows is a massacre. The orcs can’t even touch him except on a 20, and he has no problem butchering them in return (he took cleave as his bonus feat). After he killed about 40 orcs with impunity, I decided to have the mob run to the hills. I was pretty disappointed, as my plot was completely derailed. However, the cherry on top of this entire mess is what happened next.

Jack Bane roared as he chased after the fleeing Orc horde. The power of his God, the mighty Sarenrae, shone through his body. He hacked and slashed, and his enemies were cut down like chaff before him. It was only when he had chased the Orcs half a mile into the woods that he stopped, panting for breath. As he limped back to Oakville, he was greeted as the hero of the hour by the cheering villagers. Jack takes off the armor and the bracers, and lays the belt on top of them. He brings them, to the center of the village, lays them down, and kneels before them in prayer. He thanked his god, Sarenrae, and gave up the magic items in offering. I think that Frastus Rastiff teared up a bit, not at this beautiful gesture, but at the thought of losing that much potential gold. I ruled that the items disintegrated to golden light that flew up to the heavens. At this point, I pretty much had to reward the player for not keeping the magic items and ruining the game, as well as for the spectacular roleplaying. I had the divine light bathe his falchion, which he named Hyperion. I ruled that it was a +1 magic sword from now on, and was blessed by the goddess as a tool of her will. I don’t know quite where the story is going from here, but I just think that this moment has to be shared. Where should I take the story from here? I don’t really know.

ComaVision
2015-05-14, 11:14 AM
Assuming this is D&D 3.5, Bracers of Armour and actual armour don't stack, only the larger armour bonus applies. I imagine you've learned that boosting up saves is largely more important than AC now though :P

Enjoyed the story.

Oroboros
2015-05-14, 11:28 AM
Assuming this is D&D 3.5, Bracers of Armour and actual armour don't stack, only the larger armour bonus applies. I imagine you've learned that boosting up saves is largely more important than AC now though :P

Enjoyed the story.
Let's just say I meant it to be a ring of protection. Also, yeah, lesson learned. Next time he gets a cloak of resistance. I didn't read their charsheets closely enough, and I figured the worst that could happen when fighting lv 1 PCs is a failed save vs color spray.

ComaVision
2015-05-14, 11:42 AM
So what's the experience for a level 1 party that defeats an entire orc warband? :smallbiggrin:

Oroboros
2015-05-14, 11:54 AM
So what's the experience for a level 1 party that defeats an entire orc warband? :smallbiggrin:
Yeah... I am only giving them credit for the orcs that they killed, not the ones that fled. Even so, they all hit level 2. If I gave them xp for all 600, they would almost be lv 5.

turbo164
2015-05-14, 01:48 PM
That's the kind of story that will get retold for years among your players :) Hooray for wacky dice!

Although another rules nitpick, Full Plate takes 1d4+1 minutes to remove and 4 minutes to put on (can be halved with an assistant), so the orcs had at least 30 rounds to chop up civilians before the paladin could make his triumphant return ;)

Oroboros
2015-05-14, 02:16 PM
That's the kind of story that will get retold for years among your players :) Hooray for wacky dice!

Although another rules nitpick, Full Plate takes 1d4+1 minutes to remove and 4 minutes to put on (can be halved with an assistant), so the orcs had at least 30 rounds to chop up civilians before the paladin could make his triumphant return ;)

Oh, they did. I didn't explicitly write any of that out, but there were plenty of villager deaths. There were plenty of villagers willing to help, and I let him do a few skill checks to rush the process, but there were still a good couple rounds of combat. Honestly, Frastus the bard was the MVP here. Inspire Courage is a lifesaver in these mass-fights.

YossarianLives
2015-05-14, 02:56 PM
Awesome story. Maybe you could have Reznark's son come back for revenge or something.

Ettina
2015-05-16, 10:34 AM
Yeah... I am only giving them credit for the orcs that they killed, not the ones that fled. Even so, they all hit level 2. If I gave them xp for all 600, they would almost be lv 5.

I think according to the rules you can't level up more than once from a single fight. So even if you gave them xp for the ones who fled, they'd be capped at one xp short of level 3.

McStabbington
2015-05-16, 04:04 PM
Have them start finding Orc women and children fleeing from the BBEG. They saved the town from the Horde, but game out the consequences of that: refugees, strained logistics and villagers at the orcs' throats.

Susano-wo
2015-05-16, 06:22 PM
Soooo, the orcs were right behind their leader right? like, all 600 of em(as space permitted.)? So...when this guy does his Coup De Grace after the guy falls down, doesn't the mean that the orcs will go before he can move again, and fall upon him? Not sure how this is supposed to work. >.>