My Campaign: Recaps and Advice

[Delicious Taffy]

I've finally started my long-planned D&D campaign. This is the one I mentioned in the past, which I had originally intended to have six players, all using two characters. As of now, the player count is 3, with a possible fourth. Two have played, so far.

It's this two-PC session I'd like to discuss here. In the party, we have Dirt (Unaligned Kobold Fighter) and Ivy (Chaotic Good Pixie Rogue/Bard Hybrid). With a missing player and slight unfamiliarity with this system none of us have played, as well as a very late starting hour, I decided to have a practice run.

Starting the party off in an inn, I had them describe what their characters would be doing, and turned it into a brief set of skill checks. Dirt was in an arm-wrestling competition with each contestant wagering a magical item. After determining arm-wrestling rules, we made the appropriate rolls and he wound up coming in second place. Meanwhile, Ivy attempted to pickpocket everyone in sight. She managed to get some coins off the first couple, but got backhanded by a dwarf on her last attempt.

Between skill checks, they tried their hand at social interaction. Dirt's player has been in previous games I've run, so he was already comfortable with my usual NPC behavior (mostly somewhat standoffish and scatterbrained) to hold a couple of decent conversations. Ivy's player is new to RPGs, so her interactions consisted more of telling me how her character responded, rather than getting in-character.

After trying skill checks and roleplaying separately, the players decided to introduce their characters to each other. Dirt left the inn with a flyer for the main plot, and Ivy huffed after him to scold him for not caring about the dwarf smacking her across the room. Dirt mostly ignored her, so she tossed a shuriken at him, which mostly just stung a little. Ivy then huffed her way into joining Dirt on his adventure, and they headed toward the capital.

At this point, I tossed a group of four people on the trail, heading toward the inn, to gauge how the two would react to something like this in the future. Dirt was more interested in getting to the capital, but Ivy decided to pick everyone's pockets, firmly establishing what I can already tell will become a running theme. The first guy noticed her attempt, but failed to see the pixie and assumed Dirt had bumped him, causing him to drop his wallet. The other three started to help him look, which Ivy took as an open invitation. She managed to free them of a couple hundred coins, along with a glass cutter and one guy's tarot reading (King of Cups and 8 of Coins, for those interested). I closed the session here and awarded them each 50 XP. I asked them for their thoughts, and the only suggestion was to come more prepared, next session.


So, my question is this: Can you see any obvious spots I could use improvement? I'm not sure how balanced it is to allow one character to obtain a Belt of Resilience and Alchemist's acid, and the other to pickpocket nearly 400gp of assorted coins, as well as a fee miscellaneous items, in the very first session.

This seems to be a habit of mine, granting my players boons of this sort during our introductory sessions. They seem to enjoy it and make good use of their bonuses, so I'm somewhat conflicted. Balance is important, but I'm sure the occasional random windfall couldn't hurt, used sparingly.

[MoutonRustique]

There are quite a few ways to go about this (these are just some possibilities):

1- just roll with it - if you give out "too much" loot, your players will potentially be stronger than they should (I stress that it's a possibility because there's no guarantee they'll convert all that extra loot into power). It is very easy to account for extra power.

2 - "pretend" to just roll with it - you behave a bit like (1), but you subtly add some gold sinks. Tolls, taxes, higher prices, reduced availability of certain items, etc. This can be a bit tricky to pull off and not get spotted by the players though - a gold sink I've used to good effect are mounts: my players love having mounts, and they'll go for upgrades whenever they can. Its good because mounts are "easy" to kill in many situations (often the players, when given the choice, will sacrifice the mount - if there's a question which one takes the 35 dmg boulder...). In addition, you can give very modest bonuses to mounts to increase their costs by exorbitant amounts ("Why does this horse cost 2,500gp!? Because it has a +1 speed bonus! That's a BIG improvement! Look if you don't want it, there's a foppish looking dude who's crumbling under the weight of his pouches that's right there looking at the same horse..." Every time... hehehe)

3 - Have the characters gain a reputation as thieves - don't stop them from doing things, but you can refuse them lawful access to cities, banks, etc. They can also be target for other thieves.

4 - Have the action happen more where there are few rewards - monsters don't really have a use for gold... Make use of that fact - there's no real reason for there to be monetary loot everywhere.

5 - Expand on it! Give the players access to rituals and consumables - have them spend their loot on those!

Somebody smarter will probably give better advice soon! :smallthumbsup:

[Delicious Taffy]

The main plot is that the PCs are basically signing up for a dangerous scouting mission into a region everyone is pretty sure is crawling with monsters and other dangers. I got the basic idea from the webcomic Stand Still, Stay Silent. My current line of thinking is that it's a great place to find loot and establish trade routes, but also somewhat expensive to get around safely. Horses, carts, cartographers, that sort of thing.

[Beoric]

So, my question is this: Can you see any obvious spots I could use improvement? I'm not sure how balanced it is to allow one character to obtain a Belt of Resilience and Alchemist's acid, and the other to pickpocket nearly 400gp of assorted coins, as well as a fee miscellaneous items, in the very first session.

This seems to be a habit of mine, granting my players boons of this sort during our introductory sessions. They seem to enjoy it and make good use of their bonuses, so I'm somewhat conflicted. Balance is important, but I'm sure the occasional random windfall couldn't hurt, used sparingly.

If you are afraid you are giving out too many magic items, make them consumable; the problem will sort itself out eventually once you find the right balance.

To put pickpocketing cash into perspective, consider that the 4e prices for mundane items are pretty close to 3e prices, and 3e assumed a "minimum wage" of 2 sp per day.

Also consider that, over the course of first level, a PC receives 1000 XP, and on average will receive 144 gp and have an 80% chance of getting a permanent magical item. A level one skill challenge of complexity 1 is worth 100 XP, and on average will give you 144 silver pieces. You also have about an 8% change of a permanent magic item (or close enough that I'm not going to calculate it exactly).

Picking a single pocket is one-quarter of a skill challenge.

So at first level you could grant an average of 36 sp every time a pocket is picked (that's 4d8+18), plus a 2% chance of a permanent magic item. Increase that if the level of the target is higher than first: 125% for a second level target, 150% for a third level target, etc. This would be my preferred method for its relative simplicity.

You can recalculate at second level, but she'll probably be bored of picking pockets by then.

[Vitruviansquid]

If you're going to make the meat of your campaign about exploration, I would suggest that you start setting up some kind of foreshadowing. If you've played the video game Half Life 2, they do this with Ravenholm.

Have people constantly refer to some horrible dungeon and remark about how horrible it is. For example, when the PCs first arrive at the region they'll be scouting, their first assignment is to scout somewhere relatively safe and the person who gives them that mission remarks "we're not going to throw you at (dangerous area) untested." After the PCs finish their first assignment, they might see some maimed adventurers who were obviously given hell, and the adventurers will talk about "we never shouldn't gone to (dangerous area)." On your third session after the PCs have arrived in the region, contrive to force them to go the dangerous region.

This could also work with a person or an organization or whatever. The important part is to establish early what the PCs are supposed to dread.

[Delicious Taffy]

Ooh, I hadn't considered giving my campaign a Ravenholm. That's an excellent suggestion, thank you.

As for magic items, if I give them out frequently, I'll probably make them primarily consumables, as Beoric suggests. If I'm giving out too many, the problem will sort itself out in time.

I'll probably try to limit how often the players get magic items to begin with, since this was mostly a one-off bonus for my beginners.

[Delicious Taffy]

Today's the first official session. If anyone is interested, I can set up a dedicated thread for my campaign.

[Delicious Taffy]

After a couple of days to think it over, I've decided to log my session details questions here, rather than a separate thread. So, here goes.

Session 1: Dirt and Ivy continued their journey to the capital. As they walked, a bright blue portal appeared in the sky. A man emerged, screaming as he fell. At that moment, a large gentleman had just happened to be walking by, cheerfully greeting our heroes. The falling man pulled a bag out of his pocket on the way down, and pulled it over the gentleman as he reached the ground. He revealed it to be a minor Bag of Holding, showing off the wealth he had brought with him. Our heroes were unimpressed.

The newcomer introduced himself as Dalius, and claimed to be from a place called Prodesto, which Dirt told him didn't exist in this world. Dalius noticed Ivy and accidentally insulted her size, earning him a tiny arrow to the face. At this point, three people passed by. Dalius responded to their arrival with hostility, running one through with his sword and forcing the head of a second through the wound. Ivy picked the pocket of the remaining civilian, and Dalius threw the lot of them into his Bag, angering the aristocrat inside.

I was getting aggravated by this point, since these antics were exactly the reason I had refused to continue the campaign Dalius was native to. He had been impulsive there, as well, but not to nearly this degree. I'll be cracking down on this in the future. It's too disruptive, and drags on too much. Out of frustration, I had a wizard appear in front of the party, who attempted to help them identify the nature of Dalius's portal. He was summarily brushed off, and went to the woods to hunt donkey-bears, because I had really given up on sense at this point. Dalius followed with no explanation, hunted down a deer, and partially skinned it. He made its hide into a sack, which he then filled with gunpowder from his bullets, lit on fire, and dropped into his Bag with some rocks, to kill everyone he had placed inside moments before. I'll be banning this as well. The fat gentleman inside, who I named Calphe, was the only survivor, which I intend to make a running theme. Calphe will not die until I say so.

After these pointless shenanigans, the party finally decided to resume their journey to the capital. I was already fed up with the nonsense, so I time-skipped them there to save myself a headache. Dalius immediately ran to the fountain in the town square, filled his bag with water, and dumped Calphe in the fountain, along with the remains of everyone else inside and the shrapnel from his makeshift bomb. Ivy made a more sensible choice and headed to the blacksmith with her recently-acquired gold. After a bit of bumbling, he accidentally overcharged her for a parrying dagger, and sold her 20 throwing knives at a bulk discount. She pickpocketed the overcharge back and left. Dirt went directly to the nearest inn for lunch. Once inside the inn, which is called the Granite Viper, he asked a gnome lady at the counter if they sold apples. She told him she didn't work there and called over the innkeeper, Chaps, who began looking through the menu. As his wife was the one who wrote the menu, Chaps quickly grew upset at her constant use of tarts and pies with strange ingredients. He finally managed to find a reasonable meal, and went to cook it, crying. Dirt left for a moment to relieve himself.

Dalius followed Ivy into the blacksmith just as she was leaving, and purchased a dagger for himself. Ivy headed to the magic shop, looking for something. The Shardmind at the counter (named Kuri) helpfully offered her some examples of her merchandise, which were largely ignored. Kuri offered Ivy some Everlasting Chalk, which she refused. Finally, she settled on adding a plus to her longbow and left for the bakery. Dalius went into the magic shop and harassed Kuri, trying to sell her two large rubies he had brought with him. She refused and he left.

Dirt returned to the Granite Viper, where Chaps had finished cooking and was now sobbing into his own plate. Dirt showed him his flyer for the expedition, for which Chaps helpfully gave him directions to City Hall. Meanwhile, Ivy verbally assaulted the bakery with extremely vague requests, eventually settling on a random assortment of sweets.

At this point, things get blurry for me. The players had been ganging up on me over everything, particularly Ivy's player, who seemed genuinely angry with me over the fictional sweets. She got worse when she learned about elemental enchantments, and accused me of holding out on her. I had been losing focus more and more over the last three hours, after putting up with effectively constant arguments, so I allowed her to go back to the magic shop, despite spending the majority of her gold there already. This was met with further argument. I got fed up again and forced Dirt to talk to an idiotic civilian who claimed to be involved with the expedition. After Ivy got back from the magic shop, where she obviously had been unable to buy her enchantments, I railroaded the group to City Hall. Normally, I avoid this, but they had spent nearly four hours shouting me down about everything, all while pressing me to let them go to City Hall, which they also actively avoided. I hate indecision, and I hate being blamed for distractions people insist on themselves, so to City Hall they went.

Dalius immediately harassed the secretary about exchanging his rubies and money for gold. His money was from another world, so I decided the 7000-odd coins had, along with both rubies, translated to about 2300 gp. He instantly left to buy elemental enchantments and magic chalk. I allowed this, for my own reasons. Dirt and Ivy got the plot moving, and the party left for the Granite Viper for the night. I ended the session here, as it had dragged on for seven hours and I was sick of it.

I am not at all satisfied with the way this went. I was berated for every little thing, at times to the point of the players refusing to take "yes" for an answer. They were unorganised, indecisive, and argumentative. At one point, Dirt's player decided he wanted to make Hamburger Helper. I told him, if he wanted to, go for it. He snapped at me, asking "With what dishes??", and made me stop everything to go wash the dishes. While berating me for not continuing the game. Ivy's player stopped to go to the bathroom every hour or so, always on her turn. I got shouted at for this as well. Dalius's player was constantly fighting me for expensive gear and loot, despite this being his first session. I called for one break the entire time, which was predictably met with griping and arguments, despite the players themselves refusing to stop interrupting the game for trivial reasons.

I don't think I can carry on this campaign, if every session is going to be like this. I made it abundantly clear from the start that this is not a Players VS DM situation. The only options I can see are cutting it short before it begins, or cracking down severely. I cannot avoid an argument, either way. Any and all advice is welcome and appreciated.

[Beoric]

This is not an in-game problem. This is an issue of conflicting expectations from the game, which can only be resolved out of game, if at all.

I wouldn't want to play with a group behaving that way either. However, I don't think it is going to help to punish the characters for what is really a problem with the players. You say, several times, some variant of " I was getting fed up so I did [X] to the party." If you are getting frustrated enough that you are defaulting to "cracking down severely", its time to call it a night. Don't DM when you are angry.

Once you have cooled down, in an hour or a day or whatever it takes, talk about it and see if you and the players can reach an accommodation. If not, its time to find one or more new players. There's no point in playing if you aren't having fun.

[Delicious Taffy]

This Sunday, I'll be setting a 4-hour maximum on the session. I have neither the stamina nor the focus for a 7-8 hour marathon. I've also started asking the players what they want to see more of, so I can get ideas for the next session. So far, they're asking for combat and puzzles, which I'm all for.

As always, I'm open to suggestions. I've already begun incorporating the previous ideas into my notes.

[Delicious Taffy]

As expected, yesterday's session went moderately well. Unfortunately, it was not without its drawbacks. Let's dive right in.

Dirt, Ivy, and Dalius woke up the next morning, and were soon visited by three men: Father Charles the priest, Mikhael the baker, and Mondrello the banker. Mondrello explained his purpose, which was to provide the party with a small chest of bank notes. These bank notes can be used at any approved trading post in the Lost Kingdom, but have no value elsewhere and can only be used with certain limitations, as a way to deter anyone signing up for the expedition and then running away with their funds. With the transaction complete, the three men left the Granite Viper.

The party set out after breakfast, with Ivy visiting the bakery and magic shop to apologise for her rudeness yesterday, Dalius trying to disenchant his weapons and depositing his money into the bank, and Dirt purchasing some sweet rolls. Once they left the city, the road was mostly uneventful, save for a quick (failed) pickpocket attempt by Ivy. Around midday, the party stopped for a rest, meeting some friendly picknickers. A brief conversation followed between Dirt and one of the picknickers, concerning the expedition. Ivy successfully picked the pockets of another, while Dalius used his Bag of Holding to play tricks on the rest.

After an hour or so, the picknickers packed up and left. Before they even reached the trail, however, one was suddenly taken out with an arrow, with another being hit by a fireball. Dirt looked for the source, and immediately spotted a trio of goblins, accompanied by two fire beetles. The party leaped into action, confronting these goblins. Dalius quickly singled out their leader, and the two spent the battle locked in a duel. Ivy and Dirt were set upon by a goblin and fire beetle each, with one goblin spontaneously retreating. The beetles proved hard to land a solid blow on, one even knocking Ivy unconscious for a moment, killing itself in the process. Dirt managed to clear her some space long enough for her to regain consciousness, then finished off his beetle. Dalius finally won his duel, just as Dirt finished his goblin off. The party looted three gemstones off the goblins' corpses, with Dirt eating one of the goblins.

Exhausted, the party returned to the picnic site and slept until nightfall. This is where I ended the session.

Aside from increasingly frustrated players and one incident in which I snapped at Dirt's player for being irritable and communicating poorly, this first combat encounter went well. The players were rolling quite low this session, leading to their frustration. Dalius's player in particular was agitated and grew apathetic, refusing to do anything but "hit the goblin some more", as he put it. He outright refused to use his powers, because "Dalius doesn't know what he can do in this world". Ivy's player, to my relief, was much more calm this session, and patiently asked me to look up her powers when she was unsure of them.

This was the first experience any of us have had with combat in 4e, so it was touch-and-go for the first few rounds, while we figured out the basics. If I were to change anything about this campaign, it would be my own lack of experience going in. But, we're all learning together, which I think is ultimately a good thing. I enforced a 4-hour play limit as well, which went over better than expected. I did cheat once or twice, however, retreating to the kitchen for water to buy myself time to come up with the next event. In the future, I'll do this less.

As always, I am open to suggestion.

[Delicious Taffy]

Another Sunday past, another session completed. This one ended on a nice cliffhanger, so that works out for me. I'll jump straight into it.

Dalius, Dirt, and Ivy woke up in the middle of a forest, far from the path they had fallen asleep by. They checked their surroundings and headed south, toward a wall Dirt had spotted. After a short time, the party arrived at a clearing, illuminated by moonlight. Several minutes of investigation followed, from Dirt inspecting the soil, to Dalius attacking the trees. They discovered that there was magic emanating from this clearing, but were unable to determine its nature. Occasionally, Ivy or Dalius would hear a voice in their heads, with seemingly random messages. In the midst of their investigation, a loud crashing of trees was heard to the east. They gave up on the clearing and rushed to check it out.

Upon arrival, they found seven trees in a starburst pattern, with no visible roots or stumps anywhere. Dirt found a face-shaped indentation in the center of the formation, just as Ivy spotted a green light behind one of the trees. The voice from before told her not to look, and she shot an arrow at the tree. The party approached the source of the light, but the tree was suddenly engulfed in green fire and toppled directly at them. When the dust settled, they found a flaming skull with jewels for eyes floating before them. Ivy threw a dagger at it, to which it responded with a burst of green fire, knocking the party over. It demanded to know what they were doing in the forest, and why they were attacking it. A short argument ensued, with Ivy insisting the skull had been attacking them, and the skull growing more and more confused.

Eventually, they managed to learn that the skull possessed ancient arcane knowledge, and had come to the forest investigating an otherworldly power it had sensed there. Even more eventually, and after much bickering between the four, Dalius admitted he was probably the source of the otherworldly magic. The skull asked what he knew of his own abilities, to which Dalius revealed he was unable to do most of what he could in his home realm. The skull informed him that it was able to give him the knowledge required to reach his current potential in this world, marking him as a Swordmage. During these exchanges, a giant shadow drew closer, which Dirt took notice of and began tunneling.

Once Dalius had learned his powers, the shadow was close enough for everyone to identify it as that of a massive dragon. The skull convinced the others to flee into the tunnel Dirt had dug, and the group began the process of quietly digging away from the dragon. A few minutes later, Dalius returned to the opening, only to find the dragon directly above him, looking at him. The dragon intimidated him and asked him to go fetch the skull. Over the next hours, they dug nearly a mile, until Dalius informed Dirt (who was already underground when they learned the shadow's nature) that a dragon had been approaching them. Dirt dropped everything and ran back through the tunnel, rushing to meet this dragon. It was at this point that the skull revealed why the dragon had been approaching them; it had escaped from the dragon's hoard, and was now being hunted down to be taken home.

Ivy was already tired of the skull, which had given her quite a bit of attitude during their argument, and was all for returning it to the dragon. Dalius was afraid of the dragon itself, agreeing with Ivy to return the skull. They resolved to head back and meet the dragon, with the skull very reluctantly following, tossing out threats every so often and being shot down with easy responses. "I could destroy all three of you without trying." "Yeah, but you'll be stuck underground with a dragon looking for you."

Dirt arrived at the entrance a few minutes before the others, and immediately began trying to worship the dragon out of Kobold nature. This reverence was met with irritation and annoyance, and the dragon immediately told Dirt to drop the formalities and hand over the skull. After a minute or two of this, the others arrived. The dragon asked the skull if it was ready to come home. The skull replied that it hated the hoard, as it felt its knowledge was being wasted there. In the short time it had been away, it had already taught a man from another world how to use his innate abilities and given him an idea where to disenchant his weapon, and used this as evidence that it was of better use in the outside world than it ever could be in the hoard.

The dragon mulled this over carefully, but ultimately decided he wanted the skull to return to the hoard, at least until he died. He offered the party a deal: "Return my Skull to me, and you will gain a powerful ally. I am an ancient silver dragon, known throughout the mountain region I call home. My name alone will give you status akin to nobility, with all that such status brings."

The skull offered its own deal. "If you refuse his offer and help me escape for good, I will grant you each powerful magical knowledge."

The dragon countered with, "In addition to gaining me as an ally, I will provide one favor to you, which you can invoke at any time."

The skull finished the barter with, "I will tell you how to kill the dragon, and grant you power to rival true champions."


This is where I ended the session. Next week, the party will have to choose a side. If they side with the dragon, they'll gain a patron and some decent status. Siding with the skull will lead to them killing the dragon and learning new powers (AKA leveling up). The dragon is indeed an Ancient Silver Dragon, which I acknowledge is a very high-level enemy. The skull's method of killing the dragon will give it a severe power reduction, and will provide significantly less EXP than a regular encounter of this grade. The skull itself is a Great Flameskull, yet again a level-inappropriate encounter. All of this is very deliberate on my part. I wanted to see how the players would react if I presented them with something out of the Monster Manuals, but an intelligent encounter that could obviously destroy them without effort. My hope was that they would try to roleplay their way through the situation, and for the most part, it seems to have worked. In fact, they seem to be enjoying this situation more than their encounters with the townspeople or their battle with the goblins. I may end up making further use of this dynamic in the future, but sparingly enough to avoid abuse.

Out-of-game conflict in this session consisted of me spraying everyone randomly with air freshener, in an attempt to set up a certain detail at the clearing. Dirt's player took this as an attempt to embarrass him in front of everyone, which got on my nerves and led to several minutes of us both being passive-aggressive toward each other before ultimately moving on. After this, the session went smoothly, so I'm overall satisfied.

[Delicious Taffy]

Since this seems to have become more of a recap thread than an advice thread, I may end up moving these recaps somewhere more appropriate, if there's such a place. For now, on with the story.

Faced with a choice between returning the Flameskull back to its dragon master, or accepting its offer to kill the dragon and gain its power, our heroes briefly deliberated. After just a few minutes, they chose to return the skull and gain the dragon's patronage. However, Dalius and Ivy were still somewhat distrustful, and asked how they could prove their connection to him. He thought for a moment and plucked one of his smaller (still fist-sized) scales, enchanting it with a Sending spell unique to him. He then revealed his name: Krivaanlothur, Lord of the Southeast Mountains. After explaining to the heroes how having him as a patron would work, Krivaanlothur offered to fly them out of the forest and halfway to their destination, free of charge. Dirt had taken a walk during the negotiations, so they picked him up and took off into the night sky.

While they flew, Krivaanlothur became surprisingly chatty, asking each party member about themselves and answering questions about dragons in return. Dirt told him about how he had left his village to prevent the other kobolds from relying on him too much, as he was leagues stronger than anyone in his community. Dalius asked about minotaurs, telling a short story of his companion Durrak Whitehide. He also inquired about what races from his home realm were reflected in this one, learning the differences between Dracon and Dragonborn. Ivy fell asleep almost immediately, and stayed that way until the flight was over. Eventually, the other two followed suit, and Krivaanlothur flew in silence for the next few hours.

Around mid-morning, Krivaanlothur landed, waking the party. They had arrived at the south end of an enormous lake, less than a mile from the nearest town. Their patron reminded them not to abuse the Sending Scale, wished them luck, and flew away. Dirt immediately leapt into the lake to wash himself and catch some late breakfast. Ivy sat nearby, grumping all over the grass in protest of being awake. Meanwhile, Dalius had decided to take a walk nearby. Dirt started a small fire and built an impromptu cooking range for the fish, and before long, the food was ready. Ivy perked up a bit after eating, and the two looked around for Dalius. They noticed him disappear into a nearby tower, and decided to investigate.

This is where things began to get a bit silly. While the other two were waking up and getting ready for breakfast, Dalius was slowly wandering toward town. He found a small tower with a mildly ornate door, and felt compelled to go knock. A strange, stilted voice answered; "Hello, Dally Us. Feel free to come in, I do not get many visitors these days." Dalius hesitated for a moment, but entered the tower anyway. Inside, he looked around and saw that it was sparsely furnished, with little in the way of decoration. A couch, a few chairs, and some shelves made up the entirety of the furniture. In the corner was a small, empty sink.

"Go ahead and make yourself at home, just do not look inside of my mirror. It has nothing special about it at all, and is not important." The voice said, from no apparent source. Dalius immediately went up the nearby staircase, into a room with a purple curtain on one wall. He hesitantly opened the curtain, revealing a small desk shelf with a large round mirror above it. "What the hell did I just say to you, Dally Us? I am wish for you to stop messing with the mirror."

After a few minutes of experimental pokes and prods, the voice spoke again. "Fine. You can look in my mirror, but I do not expect you to understand what I say about it to you." Around then, another knock came at the door. "Oh, for Pelor's sake, here are a new guests. Come on inside, Dirt and Ivy. Dally Us is already in here waiting for you." Dirt entered the tower, but Ivy remained outside, suspicious. Inside, Dirt was greeted by the voice again. "Dally Us is upstairs playing peekaboo with my mirror. Just don't take anything out of the sink." Looking at the sink, Dirt noticed that it was empty. He mimed scooping some air out of it with his hands. "What did I just say to you, Dirt. I told you not to mess with my effing sink air, and now you have messed it all up." (Side note: The voice was quite a bit more vulgar than this, but I've chosen to tone it down for the purposes of this recap.)

Several minutes went by of Dirt arguing with the voice, but it eventually persuaded him to join Dalius at the mirror. "If you want to make change, start with the man in the mirror. And then I want you to tip it," the voice said. The two checked the reflection and saw that in the mirror's version of the room, it was filled with piles upon piles of gold, silver, and gems. Dalius immediately reached for the mirror, but his hand met nothing except cold glass. "That is not what I effing meant, and you know it, you dumb piece of cowboy excrement." Dirt got tired of dealing with the voice, and decided to start wrecking the furniture unitl he got some straight answers. He punched walls, tore at floorboards, smashed shelves, and even urinated on the couch before throwing it at the sink.

"Okay, I am going to leave until you all chill the eff out. This is getting ridiculous." The voice went silent inside the tower. Outside, Ivy was being ceaslessly pestered by several different voices, all variously asking and demanding she come into the tower. While Dirt rampaged, Dalius was inspecting the mirror, in an attempt to solve the voice's riddle. He tried to knock the mirror off of the wall, but it remained stuck no matter what he tried. Dirt suggested putting a coin into the mirror, thinking maybe the voice meant it wanted a monetary tip. This lasted for nearly half an hour, until the voice came back. The tower magically expanded, dragging Ivy inside. The other two convinced her to join them at the mirror.

"You guys are absolutely insane. You are the rudest guests I have ever effing had, and I am tired of dealing with your nonsense. If it stops the lizard from rampaging and the pixie from grumping up my grass, I will give you another hint to my riddle. I do not want your money, and I'm tired of you adventuring types throwing coins into my mirror. You are not supposed to knock the mirror over, break it, or toss your money inside." The party looked at each other. "In the cabinet to your right, you will find a bunch of hats. You all need to pick the right hat, milady."

Dalius went to the cabinet and opened it, revealing dozens of hats of different shapes. He put on a fedora, handing one to Dirt, then went to the mirror. Taking a chance, he tipped his hat at the mirror. "That's it. You're doing it right, finally." Music started playing from nowhere. "Now, keep it up. I need all three of you to get into the groove. Move your body, move your body. It is going to cost you nothing." Dirt joined Dalius, but Ivy refused to be part if this ridiculous ritual. The mirror started glowing slightly, the light growing with each tip of the guys' fedoras, but the voice kept insisting Ivy join. She got fed up with the nonsense, and was already annoyed by this strangely-hectic diversion she had been dragged into. Ivy reluctantly put on a tiny fedora, faced the mirror, and sarcastically tipped it. "Yeah, I guess that is going to have to be good enough. The pixie hates fun. Dalius, you are an absolute party demon, on the other hand. And Dirt, you are okay I suppose."

The mirror glowed brightly and flashed. "For solving my strange riddle, you may now enter the mirror, where nothing unusual is going to happen to you." The party entered the mirror and found themselves in the reversed version of the room, filled with treasures just as it had seemed. On the opposite side of the room was a large parrot on a perch, which looked at them curiously. "Welcome to the mirror," said the voice, "I am Crigger, the magical tower of secrets. You have solved my riddle, so you are welcome to my treasure. To your left is a shelf with three bags on it. You may each fill up one of the bags with as much loot as you can fit. I am aware you have a Bag of Holding, but I cannot allow you to use it here. My master has forbidden it."

Our heroes filled their bags with gold and gems, with Dalius also grabbing a few bottles of liquor from the downstairs cabinet, and they left the tower. "Thank you for humoring this old tower. You guys turned out to be alright after all. Feel free to come back any time. Remember; I am Crigger the Tower, located off Exit Twenty-Two, just half a mile from Gebanhood." With their brand new bags full of gold and jewels, our heroes set off for Gebanhood Village.

This session was the smoothest so far. The only holdup was Ivy's player going through her rulebooks to find everyone's powers, so she can print them off later. This took up most of her time, but she gave a passable in-character excuse for Ivy's lack of action, and having everyone's powers right in front of them would speed things up considerably during combat, so I let it slide. The party is now at Level 2, as well. I figured I had given them enough encounters to earn all the experience for it, and they've all been roleplaying surprisingly well, so they get to climb their Echeladders a bit.



To hear what Crigger's voice is like, go here (http://www.acapela-group.com/demo-tts/DemoHTML5Form_V2.php) and choose WillFromAfar. For the music that played while the party solved the riddle, check out this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlxfDvSyPKA&ab_channel=an0nymooose)

[Future Sword]

This seems like an interesting campaign. If I have any criticisms, it's that your players seem really easily distracted, and even a bit domineering. Your encounters also seem to have quite a high risk level, for first-level characters. An ancient silver dragon isn't something I'd expect to encounter for quite a while in a campaign, and yet you threw one at your party in the third session. Not that that's a bad thing, of course. Being put up against stakes like those would make me feel even cooler for overcoming them, for sure.

[Delicious Taffy]

My players are turning into bandits.

After the encounter with Crigger, they went to the nearby Gebanhood village. Their introduction to this town was Dalius punching one of the guards in the face, with lethal results. The other guard ran away with a hand bell, to alert the rest of the town. He barely made it 50 feet before Dirt caught up and stabbed him in the back of the head. Dalius put the corpses in his Bag of Holding (I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but he brought it from his home dimension, where it works a little bit differently with bodies), but not before a little girl came back from the nearby flower field and saw him. He managed to persuade her that the guards (her uncles) had a bounty on their heads for possession of illegal substances, and she went home. Dalius headed to the nearby inn for some lunch.

Ivy ducked into a nearby shop. The gnome at the counter cheerfully bought a couple of things Ivy had grabbed while pickpocketing, and a few minutes later, they heard a loud crash. Outside, Dirt had hidden under a covered wagon to avoid any witnesses. While he was under there, he overheard some men talking about a big shipment they were transferring. Before much longer, several knights came to the wagon on horseback. This is where some of the details got jumbled up and I lost track of what the players were saying, since Dalius and Dirt's players were elsewhere, talking to us over Skype, and decided to mute themselves several times.

The gist of it was, the wagon was filled with boxes of platinum bars, surrounded by Warforged knights on horseback, effectively the equivalent of a modern-day bank van with a police escort. And the party intended to rob it. Dirt started the heist by jumping out from under the wagon, waving his coin bag, and ran off toward the woods. Two of the guards took off after him, leading to an extended chase through the woods, back past the Crigger tower, and all the way to the lake the party had been dropped off at to begin with, before Dirt finally dove into the lake, staying under just long enough for the knights to give up and go back to town.

During Dirt's chase, Dalius hid Ivy in his Bag, took her over by the wagon while the knights were distracted still, and dropped the bag into the wagon, standing in front of the opening to block her from view. He struck up a conversation with the lead knight, who proved to be surprisingly chatty, quickly taking over with stories of his own exploits. The two traded stories for quite some time, while Ivy quietly removed the bars from their chests. After some time, the other two knights returned, declaring Dirt to be a distraction. The knights looked into the cart, just as Ivy was stuffing two last chests into the bag. She darted out the front of the cart, diving into a nearby tree to hide. The party scattered, hiding out in various alleys, until the knights went back to the wagon and left.

After a long wait, the party left town with their newfound loot. They'd managed to steal hundreds of pounds worth of metal bars, pushing the Bag of Holding to its limit. Any more strain, and they'll face some serious consequences. I also understand how game-breaking it could be for the party to possess nearly 1.5 tons of solid platinum, so there are several conditions they'll have to meet to get any sort of money out of this. Even with the limitations I've set (which honestly started to feel like I was screwing them over after a minute), they're still going to make out like the bandits they are.

Player attitudes were alright during this session, although Dirt's player was in a rush to wrap things up toward the end, due to personal reasons, along with the repeated, random muting of their end of the Skype call.

[Delicious Taffy]

This week, my players seem to have bitten off more than they can chew.

About an hour and a half after leaving Gebanhood, the party was confronted by a skeleton. This skeleton emitted a huge amount of green-and-purple smoke, then knelt down and drew a pentacle in the dirt. It beckoned Dalius over to stand in the circle, which he did without hesitation. The skeleton began using its finger to draw words in blue flames, right on the air in front of it. "WATCH OUT. GO TO RAVENWOOD. AVOID THE TOWER. THE MOON ELVES WAIT UNTIL DUSK." It teleported them to a shady-looking town, with a massive black tower that was visible even from the alley they appeared in. The skies were extremely overcast, looking as if a storm could start at any moment.

Following her usual pattern, Ivy darted into the nearest shop. A Kenku named Sam greeted her, but refused to show her any of his concealment-enchanted items, telling her outright that she couldn't afford them. When asked about this, Sam explained that his shop was protected with anti-theft spells, which told him exactly what everyone who came through his door had in their pockets. Dalius came in after a few minutes with his own questions, and Sam informed him that they should talk to Derrick about smelting down their metal bars. In return for his information, Sam asked for Dalius's rubies, which he reluctantly gave him.

At Derrick's smithy, they gave the halfling their bars, which he agreed to appraise for 50 gold pieces. He told them he'd also likely be keeping any metal they didn't need, and told them to come back tomorrow, when he'd give them their bars and answer any further questions. After speaking with Derrick, Dalius walked off for a few minutes to get a better look at the black tower. He was accosted by a drunk man in black leather armor, who warned him to look out for the Eladrin, further warning that they couldn't be trusted for anything. The man passed out on the ground, and Dalius reached into his Bag of Holding. He pulled out a mirror he had taken from a fortress in his homeland, and placed it on a nearby wall, asking it several questions about the town. It only gave vague "Yes" or "No" answers, and but he was able to determine that, although the black tower was highly dangerous, he would be safe if he went inside. Dalius put the mirror away and caught up with Dirt and Ivy at the nearby inn.

The party paid 5 gold pieces for the night, which the minotaur innkeeper emphasised would include meals, their rooms, drinks, and access to the inn's reading room. The innkeeper also repeatedly emphasised the importance of proper nutrition, proper rest, and keeping all books inside the reading room. They checked into their room, but after a short time, they got a knock at the door. The innkeeper had come to inform them that they had a visitor in the dining area, and insisted they answer this visitor. A lone Eladrin was sitting in the corner booth, refusing to make eye contact with them. They sat down with him, and he explained the situation. Their heist in Gebanhood had already tipped off the authorities in all nearby towns, and Dirt already had a bounty on his head. The other two were on the posters, but not yet identified, warranting only vague descriptions. Furthermore, the local Thieves Guild was very upset with them for attacking the shipment, a move that had already been planned by the Guild for the next morning.

Now, the shipment was not only guarded even more heavily, but the Captain of the Royal Knights, Jax Undersky, had been personally sent to oversee it. The Eladrin described Undersky as an abomination, telling the party that it was now their job to assassinate him. They objected, claiming no responsibility, with Ivy in particular insisting that this was the Guild's fault for not going after the shipment sooner. Their visitor insisted right back that the Guild had absolutely no way of knowing that three random travelers would know about the shipment in the first place, let alone raid it the moment they set eyes on it. He attempted to close the discussion by informing them of two choices; either they agree to kill Undersky, or they take their chances fighting the entire Guild. As he was leaving, Dalius took out the Sending Scale, conjuring a projection of Krivaanlothur into the room. The Eladrin turned around, intrigued. A brief back-and-forth of questions ensued, in which the party gained more knowledge of the Guild, and the Eladrin learned of their alliance with the dragon. He told them he would come back the next afternoon and left.

With nothing left to do, the party passed the rest of the day and night in their room, Dirt drinking an entire bottle of booze. The next morning, the innkeeper knocked again, telling them they had another visitor. They went to the dining area again, where they were greeted by an incredibly nervous and twitchy young human woman with blonde hair and a wild look in her eye. They sat down, and the innkeeper immediately placed a plate with a large bacon sandwich in front of dirt, telling him to eat it and guaranteeing it would cure his hangover. The twitchy woman told them that Derrick was ready to talk again, fell out of her chair, and stumbled as quickly as she could out the door. The party finished eating breakfast and left for Derrick's.

The halfling smith informed them that, out of the 720 bars they had left with him (20 boxes of 36 bars), nearly all of them were decoys composed largely of nickel, aluminum, and iron. He produced only 5 bars of actual platinum, and told them that this was all he was able to get from their haul. They asked him to go ahead and turn the bars into coins, and he told them that he would be keeping 50% of the coins he made. The party argued that he was ripping them off, and insisted they keep all of the coins, even threatening to leave with just the bars. He countered that this was a very short-notice job, making money this way was illegal to begin with, and he had likely the only mint for these coins that wasn't currently in government possession, and 50% was a reasonable fee. Haggling ensued, and they managed to talk him down to a 25% fee, along with the jewels they'd obtained so far and Dalius's enchanted dagger, all of which had less collective value than the coins themselves, but which he insisted he could turn a larger profit on, given his resources. With the deal struck, the party left Derrick to mint their coins, briefly stopping at Sam's shop so Ivy could buy a cheap black cloak, and returned to the inn.

The Eladrin from last night greeted them with drinks and politely invited them to sit and negotiate with him. The drinks were initially regarded with suspicion, but the innkeeper guaranteed that the drinks were entirely on the level, having mixed them himself. Negotiations began with the Eladrin telling the party that the Don of the Guild was interested in their alliance with Krivaanlothur. He informed them that the Don still considered them to be obligated to assassinate Undersky, but was willing to help them do so, now that he was aware they had an ally that could potentially destroy the entire Guild Tower without even trying very hard. Dalius relayed all of this information to the dragon, who couldn't hear the Eladrin's side of the discussion, The party asked questions about what sort of assistance the Guild was offering in this assassination, requesting a few agents to accompany them. They were told that the Don would likely only send relatively-new recruits, to minimise any damages to their hierarchy. When they asked how they were supposed to even get near Undersky, given their wanted status, the Eladrin offered to provide them with forged identification papers marking them as nobles from another country, along with disguises. He informed them that Undersky and the shipment would be stopping at a prestigious event in the capital, and that would be their best chance to strike. They agreed, ending the call with Krivaanlothur, and the Eladrin left to prepare the arrangements.

After eating lunch at the innkeeper's insistence, the party returned yet again to Derrick. He had finished their platinum coins, and handed them over without any further fuss. This is where I ended the session, since we had been playing for several hours by then, and Dirt's player was getting antsy as usual. We tallied up their newfound wealth, I gave them their XP for role-playing so well, and we ended the Skype call. Player attitudes were refreshingly pleasant this session, although Dirt's player continued his habit of losing focus at random. That may have something to do with a semi-recent accident, but I'm not about to open that can of tarrasques, just yet. Ivy's player was still very quiet, but she was slightly more active than usual, which I'm quite proud of her for. Dalius's player seemed somewhat more mellow than usual, which I think went well with Ivy's newfound energy. Altogether, it was quite a pleasant session, and I'm looking forward to seeing how next week's turns out.

[Delicious Taffy]

This week's recap is kind of late, and I'd like to keep it as brief as possible.

Following up on their sudden windfall of cash, the party purchased some upgrades to their equipment. Ivy and Dirt got their equipment enchanted, bought some extra supplies, and also obtained some mounts. Dirt got himself a nice direwolf, and Ivy rescued a young faerie dragon from a black-market smuggler. Dalius declined to spend any of his money, and instead browbeat the Guild into providing a horse for him to use on the quest. This plays directly into certain plans Dalius's player and I have been forming for the last couple of weeks, so I didn't question it. The shopping took up the vast majority of the session, thanks to copious handbook references and long pauses. The players didn't mind this so much, since they were able to upgrade their characters, so I'm not marking it against the overall session quality.

After they finished shopping, the Eladrin from the Guild gave them his name (Salazar), summarised their quest one last time, and gave them further details when asked. The party received forged identification marking them as nobles from another country (Ivy as the Contessa of Marchspree, Dirt as La Volpe, bodyguard of the Contessa, and Dalius as Baron Mordo Bloodfeast of Raide), along with instructions to meet a Guild informant in the capital before they entered the gala that Undersky would be attending. The informant would provide them with enchanted rings to disguise them more thoroughly as their cover identities, along with any information he had gained from the gala itself. Until they reach the capital, the party will be posing as bodyguards to their cover identities. The Guild had set up provisions card, as well as a specially-illusioned carriage to project images of the Contessa, Baron, and La Volpe, which would be entering the capital before the party, to avoid them being held up before they could reach the gala. The Guild also sent six of its newest recruits along with the party, to pad out the ranks a bit.

Once they were on the road, the party were met with very little opposition for several hours, the only road bump being a young boy trying to rob them. Dirt simply hung the boy from a tree branch by his shirt and went back to the group. Later in the evening, an old man stood in front of a bridge the party needed to cross. He warned them that he was a powerful mage, but refused to give a display of his power when pressed. Dalius simply knocked him aside and they kept going. The old man got up and hopped into the provisions cart and started rifling through the boxes, eventually retrieving a two-foot string of hot peppers. He pulled a loaf of dirty bread out of his pocket and started eating it with the peppers, asking the party several pointless questions about their destination and objective. He became so persistent and annoying that Dirt tossed him into the nearby woods. Moments later, the old man came barrelling out of the woods on the back of a large buck, catching up to the party with little effort. The buck itself seemed extremely agitated, with its eyes tearing up heavily and the string of peppers suspiciously absent.

This got the party's proper attention, and Ivy decided to shoot the man in the leg as a warning. Her arrow stuck in him, and he revealed his leg to be wooden. After several attempts to peacefully remove this strange, filthy old man from their company, the party knocked his deer out from under him, and Dirt busted his wooden leg to keep him from following them. The old man thrashed around in the mud, screaming obscenities at the party until they were out of sight and earshot. That night, the caravan made camp off to the side of the road. Dirt went around talking to the others, Dalius ate and went to sleep, and Ivy began properly taming her dragon, which she had named Riwind. Just as everyone else was about to go to sleep, they heard high-pitched giggling coming from the trail behind them, followed shortly by a dragging sound. The old man had been following them, and was now dragging himself along the trail on his elbows, cackling like a madman. The first thing he did upon reaching the camp was to try climbing into the provisions again, muttering about peppers. Dirt pulled him out of the cart impatiently, whereupon the old man darted to Dalius's Bag of Holding, which Dalius has been using as an impromptu sleeping bag throughout this campaign, with Dalius still sleeping inside it. Ivy threatened to take the old man out if he didn't drop the bag, but Dirt simply walked up to the old man and cut his hand off. As Dalius climbed out of the bag, the old man began undergoing a dramatic change. Smoke had started spewing from the old man's every orifice; jet-black smoke with green sparks, coming out at an alarming rate. A piercing white light began to emanate from his eyes and throat, and he rose into the air. The party readied their weapons, and prepared for a fight.

This is where I ended the session and handed out the XP for the week. The players had pretty decent attitudes this week, with no conflicts beyond the prices of their enchantments and items (Dirt's player seems upset at how expensive these things are for such low-level characters), and a decent showing of inter-character roleplay. This is the first major time they've had an in-character conversation, and I think they did an alright job of it. Now, I'm searching through the Monster Manuals and such, looking for an appropriate creature for the party to fight in the next session. If anyone has a suggestion, feel free to let me know. Otherwise, I'll be back next week with the next recap.

[MoutonRustique]

Thanks for the report!

[Delicious Taffy]

Thanks for the report!

Are you referring to the weekly recaps, or something else entirely?

[The Ship's dog]

Sorry that I can't keep up with the character's specifics but if you want some help with thinking of what monster you should have the old man turn into then could you tell me the character's levels?

Also, it seems like the man is some sort of demon or thing from the Shadowfell so perhaps something fiery (peppers) or about hunger (obsession with food).

I'm having a lot of fun reading these recaps and I like the slight comedic air you have going in your campaign. It seems as though your players are getting into the spirit of D&D and becoming a bit more respectful towards you and being more polite as players.

[Delicious Taffy]

Oh, wow. Someone actually replied to this after so long.

Well, I hate to burst any bubbles, but this particular campaign seems like it's closed. Dirt's player caused enough problems outside the game that I've broken off all contact with him. It's a shame, really. We used to be best friends, but he started treating me like an ex-con he could barely tolerate being around, and I got tired of it. I haven't done anything in-game to punish it, but Dalius and Ivy's players haven't expressed any interest in continuing that particular campaign, so it's just sort of been left at the old man cliffhanger. The other two have acknowledged Dirt's lack of impact on the story and combat, so I get the feeling they weren't particularly enjoying his influence on the game.

It's just as well, though. This was my first real 4e campaign, and I can use it as a learning experience. There were some memorable scenes, so I'm sure the players will have at least one nice memory of it, even if that one guy dragged it down toward the end and directly contributed to the abrupt ending.

[The Ship's dog]

Oh man, sorry to hear that. It always sucks when a player becomes alienated from the DM, especially and doubly so if they are best friends. If it helps, people generally will say if you ask them, even through a text or something what's wrong if you word it correctly.

I'm glad that you are taking at least a small amount of positivity from this experience that looks, from the outside at least, pretty bad.

I am actually about to hit my summer holidays in fact (southern hemisphere) and I am keen to try an online campaign if times match up. I have played 4e regularly for about 6 months now and DMed a game of 3.5e so I won't be completely news at least if you want to do that perhaps? I could probably get 1 other friend to join in if your friends want to as well.

P.S If you are keen then we should probably continue this conversation in PM