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View Full Version : In all my years of DM-ing, I have never seen a group so screwed.



Joethegoblin
2019-01-09, 06:58 PM
So

A few sessions ago the awesome group of adventurers set out to the mountain to rid Redmire Island of a curse that plagued the land.
Before leaving, the Ranger received a gift from Lady Three-Fingers, a voodoo priestess. It was a small trinket box, and Lady Three-Fingers said explicitly:
"You only open the box in dire emergency, only when all is seemingly, and when you do, close your eyes, you and your friends."

They went to the mountain, kicked everyone´s ass, beat the curse. And they didn´t need the box.

Six months pass, and now they were stationed at Redmoor, a settlement not to far away, built around peat farming. They were asked to stay the winter as the settlement gains its permanency. During winter, on a sunday, one of the locals, Julie approaches the rogue, Blaine, to the whereabouts of Victor the carpenter. This is roughly around midnight.
They go out to investigate. To make a long story short they find out that he was last seen at the theater (yes, evidently this tiny village had a peat farm, bar and a theater. According to the rogue he was setting up a major play for the villagers.). They manage to trace his steppes, where he stepped outside, seemingly fumbled around by his lonesome in the dirt, then beelined into the swamps.
So they decide in the dead of night, to go after him, without letting anyone know, or without proper provisions.
They wind up camping in the marsh, the weather is getting periodically worse, wake up the next morning, keep on walking even though they are not sure Victor the carpenter (who evidently is very important for the theater piece, as he was building the set) was heading that way.
They stumble into Grippli/Bullywug territory and get into a fight, which they get fairly well out of. Though after the Grippli spellcaster gets away, the weather begins to get gradually worse. The bad weather becomes a storm, the storm becomes a hurricane. They are surrounded by marshland which does not provide good cover. visibility gets worse by the minute. They tie themselves together with a rope so they won´t lose each other.
They get lost, they all begin suffering from frostbite and such. The Ranger is fumbling around attempting to find a shelter, thinks about the box.
The box Lady Three-Fingers gave to him.
Without thinking, he opens the box. He closes his eyes, does not alert the party.
Out of the box comes a swarm of hellish angry spirits that tear away at the fabric of reality, shattering all those oppose them.
Those who do not close their eyes, get inflicted by the seething eyebane spell. if you are not familiar with it, it is a corruption spell and makes eyes explode.
All of them fail their fortitude saves.
Well not the Ranger, as he closed his eyes.
But the spirits continue to roam around them, looking to fulfill their role before returning to the underrealm. Except the group that let them out of the box, which yes, did not close their eyes.
So the spirits ask "what do you want of me?"
The Ranger gets perplexed by the fact that someone is asking him a question, so against explicit instruction, he decides to open his eyes.
and he fails the saving throw and his eyes burst.
So basically, they are stuck in a snow storm, in the middle of nowhere. Some of them are already exhausted from the cold, no one knows where they are, they didn´t even tell anyone they were going away. blind as bats with no direction. And also, they are not near a road, or a trade route or anything.

Pauly
2019-01-09, 07:09 PM
Sounds like either a TPK or a wandering quantum cleric are the only solutions.

Knaight
2019-01-09, 07:24 PM
This sounds like a fun starting point to me. They're in a bad situation, they get to try and figure out a way out of it, and that whole process could be a lot of fun.

Reversefigure4
2019-01-09, 10:21 PM
Lady Three-Fingers said explicitly:
"You only open the box in dire emergency, only when all is seemingly, and when you do, close your eyes, you and your friends."

I have to say, this set of instructions does not connote "Your eyes will explode unless they are shut, and you must keep them shut even after the box has been opened (and possibly forever, since no context is provided for what effect will happen or for how long)".

But then, very possibly she was trying to screw them over rather than help them?

Celestia
2019-01-09, 11:25 PM
I have to say, this set of instructions does not connote "Your eyes will explode unless they are shut, and you must keep them shut even after the box has been opened (and possibly forever, since no context is provided for what effect will happen or for how long)".

But then, very possibly she was trying to screw them over rather than help them?
Eh, it would work for me. It had a very Raiders of the Lost Ark vibe to it, so I'm more surprised that it just explodes eyes rather than also melting faces.

Erloas
2019-01-09, 11:41 PM
I would also have to agree that the warning and the results didn't really match. If that is on purpose or not...


If you're looking for a way to allow the party to survive, if as seems to be implied, the Grippli spell caster is the one making the storm get worse, having the spirit find and kill him might cause the weather to get a bit better.
A deus ex machina, but one you might be able to make seem a bit less so, is to have the voodoo priestess somehow get notified that the box was used and shows up/uses sending to see what is happening/collect the box. If that helps at all would depend a lot on how powerful she is, but given the power of the box I'm going to guess her having access to some ways of helping them isn't going to be totally out of line.

Mordaedil
2019-01-10, 02:25 AM
Eh, it would work for me. It had a very Raiders of the Lost Ark vibe to it, so I'm more surprised that it just explodes eyes rather than also melting faces.
That is how I read it as well. I think that warning should have been plenty, but that's just me. Did the ranger state he opened his eyes or did you ask "do you open your eyes?"

Because if the latter, you probably didn't make your DM voice spooky enough.

Erloas
2019-01-10, 02:47 AM
A 38 year old pop culture reference is not a good assumption for conveying an idea. I'm just slightly older than the movie and I didn't get it. Granted I'm not a movie buff by any stretch, so even a current movie reference would probably be lost on me.
Short of knowing your players really well that seems like a pretty big assumption to make.

Mordaedil
2019-01-10, 03:31 AM
Clearly, you need to take your friends in a group, sit down and have a movie night where you all watch Monty Python, Star Wars and Indiana Jones just so everyones pop culture references are on point.

Mystral
2019-01-10, 03:41 AM
The vodoo lady should propably have specifies that the box only works against combat threats and not against environmental hazards.

Tanarii
2019-01-10, 04:50 AM
Eh, it would work for me. It had a very Raiders of the Lost Ark vibe to it, so I'm more surprised that it just explodes eyes rather than also melting faces.
That's what I thought too. Certainly what I would have expected to happen the second I got those instructions. I thought I could see where this was going right up until the Ranger's party didn't die with face melting screams.

Exploding eyeballs but leaving them alive seems kinda cruel in comparison. :smallamused:

Glorthindel
2019-01-10, 04:59 AM
I am mildly amused by all the suggestions a spooky voodoo witch should have provided a detailed idiots guide (maybe with diagrams and a "how to" youtube video) for her apocalyptic weapon of mass destruction :smallbiggrin:

Sounds like the party are screwed. Depending on the players dispositions, there is a number of possible solutions:

The obvious is it is TPK time. I as a player would be perfectly fine if this was me, the party dug their own grave, and deep.

If the players are accepting of heavy penalties for their faliure, but you want the campaign to be retrievable, you can have them all make a suitable test (constitution, nature, something like that), and the one who succeeds by the highest is the sole survivor who stumbles, half starved, and suffering some major psychosis, out of the marshes six months later (missing a certain percentage of his possessions), who can then corral some locals to go back with him to find the other party members bodies (with even higher percentage of possession loss), and then decide how many ressurections and regenerations they can afford with the remainder of their wealth.

If you and your players wouldn't find either of these solutions fun, then its time to deus ex machina a powerful outsider to their location. If the party has a warlock, his patron would be an obvious choice, if not, perhaps the Voodoo witch was a devil in disguise - it would explain why the effect was so powerful, and the instructions for the players protection so vague, so as to set them up for a more ruinous bargain. The Devil can offer them rescue, and restoration of their sight in return for some pretty heavy obligations.

Elvensilver
2019-01-10, 05:46 AM
If they somehow manage to survive the exploding-eye-fairies, stumble through the swamp for some time without more mistakes of that magnitude and there having to do some survival/fortitude checks to avoid losing fingers/ears/noses to the cold, then they deserve another chance.
But just now, there where loud noises and some magical lights... And there is still a grippli magic user on the lose. This brave little bugger will sneak back, and only find a mess of a party that is whimpering/praying and huddled together to not freeze to dead. Now the mage can shine: He will take them all prisoners and cart them/ lead them back to his tribe. Here, the spellcaster will impress everygrippli by his awesome deeds of magic after having blinded an adventurer party. But he will also be interested in keeping them alive...and so the adventurers are saved, nursed back to health and somehow have to escape while blind from a dozen low-level gripplis...

Quertus
2019-01-10, 07:42 AM
So, if your players / PCs are smart*, they'll make shelter, weather the storm**, then use Survival to orient themselves***, and head back out of the swamp, following the edge of the swamp to the village. A great fun game of being at a huge, self-imposed disadvantage.

Otherwise, yeah, have them be captured.

* Which they obviously aren't
** I suggest eating the Ranger
*** Warmth of the sun, which side of the trees the moss grows on, etc

DeTess
2019-01-10, 07:57 AM
I'd not TPK because it seems to me that this problem is solely the fault of the ranger that opened the box without communicating. I'm all for punishing a really foolish party, but punishing the entire party for one player doing something really dumb without communicating feels excessive. This does depend a bit on the maturity level of the party though, and it might be a good idea to have a an OOC talk with them;

"You're properly screwed right now. Do you see a way out of this? I can envision a couple of solutions, but I can also watch your characters dying down here. What options and potential solutions are there from your point of view?"

Thrawn4
2019-01-10, 08:23 AM
So the spirits ask "what do you want of me?"


"Lead us safely out ot the swamp and back to our village."

Celestia
2019-01-10, 08:44 AM
A 38 year old pop culture reference is not a good assumption for conveying an idea. I'm just slightly older than the movie and I didn't get it. Granted I'm not a movie buff by any stretch, so even a current movie reference would probably be lost on me.
Short of knowing your players really well that seems like a pretty big assumption to make.
It's a sad day when Raiders is no longer considered a pop culture icon that everyone knows.

Joethegoblin
2019-01-10, 08:48 AM
That is how I read it as well. I think that warning should have been plenty, but that's just me. Did the ranger state he opened his eyes or did you ask "do you open your eyes?"

Because if the latter, you probably didn't make your DM voice spooky enough.

He stated himself that he opened his eyes as soon as the spirit began talking to him.

Lord Torath
2019-01-10, 09:00 AM
It's a sad day when Raiders is no longer considered a pop culture icon that everyone knows.Makes me think of this xkcd: Unquote (https://www.xkcd.com/1262/)

denthor
2019-01-10, 10:24 AM
I am a firm believer in if the party experts to find equipment better then what they have on dead adventures. Somebody had to die first. It could be your party.

EldritchWeaver
2019-01-10, 10:50 AM
"Lead us safely out ot the swamp and back to our village."

Cue the eye-popping of the villagers.

Telonius
2019-01-10, 12:07 PM
If you really want to avoid a TPK here (and this might just be a good learning experience for the players if you do), this is a terrific chance for Lady Three-Fingers (or at least one of her representatives) to reappear.

"Well, that did not go as well as I had hoped. You had been warned, adventurers. My gifts are not to be so cavalierly tossed around. But now you're in a bit of a bind. I can see that clearly, though you clearly can't. I can help you, but this time I will need something in return..."

paddyfool
2019-01-10, 04:31 PM
Yeah, the entire party are now largely at the mercy of whoever you want to throw at them. Assuming you want them to survive the storm itself. Generally I'm in agreement with the ideas of the attention of someone or something powerful being drawn to them by the release of those spirits.

For added verisimilitude, bring blindfolds to the table for each player to your next session. Keep dice rolls to a minimum, and emphasise that they should roleplay whatever bargaining they may seek to do with whomsoever you throw at them. Whether you want it to be a devil, archon, modron, dragon, fae, godling, wizard, psion or whatever, consider carefully how clear you plan to make what just happened to the characters, and how much about who and what their "rescuer" / new employer / exploiter / frenemy is you wish them to be aware of.

Thrawn4
2019-01-10, 05:26 PM
Cue the eye-popping of the villagers.

All I hear is "campaign continues with reasonable in-game repercussions".

geppetto
2019-01-11, 05:12 AM
I'd say its a chance for the ranger to make up for foolishness and even shine a little.

Have him use survival checks to lead the party back to safety. But each time he fails a check some horrible fate befalls a PC, quicksand, open mine shaft, etc etc. Just make sure you dont call for enough checks to kill everyone if he rolls badly.

Then back at the village they get healed, go back out gather the bodies of the fallen and rez them. Probably putting themselves deeply in debt to some unwholesome NPC.

GreatWyrmGold
2019-01-11, 04:36 PM
I have to say, this set of instructions does not connote "Your eyes will explode unless they are shut, and you must keep them shut even after the box has been opened (and possibly forever, since no context is provided for what effect will happen or for how long)".

But then, very possibly she was trying to screw them over rather than help them?
Eh, I'd say it fits. It's pretty common in legends and literature alike for such mystic warnings to not mention the consequences of ignoring them. Not mentioning that there are consequences for opening your eyes after opening the box is...unfortunate, but the rest makes perfect sense. Besides, the first myth anyone thinks of with such vague dire warnings is probably Orpheus, who was also screwed over for not realizing quite when the prohibition ended.



He stated himself that he opened his eyes as soon as the spirit began talking to him.
I probably would have said something like "You open your eyes?", or maybe "Are you sure?" if I thought the player needed a hint. Something to let the player firmly seal their own fate.



I'm going to second the notion that the ranger should be punished more than the other characters, and that the campaign should continue. I'm not sure how, but depending on how far the eye-popping spirits went, the local frog-people (and predators) probably won't be much of a threat. I'd probably let the players stumble around blindly for a while, then manage to find their way back to civilization and find a solution to the problem which happens to require a sacrifice which the ranger is most-equipped to make. (Said sacrifice and the nature of the resulting solution will depend heavily on what the ranger has and what the rest of the party lacks.)
If it's a big enough sacrifice, you might throw the party (and ranger) a bone by having the antagonists still be blinded. They expended the eye weapon and made another sacrifice, but it wasn't all for nothing.

Quertus
2019-01-11, 06:23 PM
Don't forget that there is a saving throw - some of the locals will be a threat.

Also, I'm loving the idea of the village of the blind, with some of the NPCs able to see. Creating this sudden shift in the local power structure could be a second and third awesome consequences of this idiotic action (the first being the all blind PCs game).

username1
2019-01-11, 06:26 PM
This actually sounds like an amazing opportunity. How I would run this assumes you have had been many sessions in.

So here’s what you do:
The session starts, and you run a survivalist based session. As they progress they have to be creative not to freeze. The storm could last for a long time, presenting more and more challenges. Build up the sense of hopelessness, they are going to run out of supplies, and succumb to the storm. Let the session end with them falling to the cold, slipping away. Over play the drama, make them feeling like they themselves are dying. At the very end describe how they fall to the cold, describe every detail. As they black out into darkness they fall, frozen to the earth. This should feel like an end, a TPK. HOWEVER! At the very end simply state something along the lines, the heroes will return.(or use your party name like, The Sehril will return) If you have a flair for dramatics I would totally say this, pick up your dm screen and walk out. Just leave. This will have great effects, the players are left alone, hopeless. You said the game will continue, but who knows at what cost. Another great thing about this is you could take a break from the game. This is a good pausing spot, take a few weeks break. Give yourself time to prepare.

Now how do you continue?
The players could wake up captives of some higher power, one who brought them back from the dead. Mabye the spellcaster they let get away. This would be up to you, but I would have this be years later. The players wake up by themselves by themselves. Mabye even in different parts of the world. Why did this person bring them back, and what powerful scheme has been put in play? If this was years later you could have the players deal with the effects of their failure. I would restore their eyes by the spellcaster spell, but what other side effects remain. Remember that village they were hired to protect. Yeah it’s destroyed. Because the players weren’t there it was wiped out by some strange creature or power. Mabye the same one that brought them back, weaving a giant scheme. This is a great situation for a dm. It’s up to you. Make something amazing happen from their failure. 😁😁😁😁

Grog Logs
2019-01-13, 11:24 AM
There's a lot of great ideas here. Here are some potential points of inspiration and salvation.

(A) INSPIRATION: What it's like to loose your senses unexpectedly in an emergency. The most important lesson here is suspense. It's less important what happens next to your PCs and more important what they DREAD will happen next. Any payoff will work better if you can instill the dread and suspense. Suspense > Horror.

(1) Daredevil (2011-2014) #7, which was written by Mark Waid and pencilled by Paolo Rivera. In this issue Matt Murdock is taking a group of blind children on a field trip. In the middle of nowhere, a deer jumps in front of the bus. The driver (the one person who is not blind) dies in the bus crash and the bus is on fire. Matt must lead the kids to safety without revealing his superhero identity. Even worse, his arch-nemesis is present: a snowstorm which renders him effectively blind (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jzqCLJnX7ts/VkBdy-L19mI/AAAAAAAAF7c/CMHl8NNrvto/s0-Ic42/Daredevil%252520007-011.jpg). You can access the issue on Marvel Unlimited if you have a subscription or for about $2 digitally. Mark Waid won an Eisner Award in 2012 for this issue and this series.

(2) The Netflix movie Bird Box (2018), where the main characters must blindfold themselves to survive a terrible threat. I have not seen this movie yet, but I advise you to avoid the Bird Box Challenge (https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/01/03/bird-box-challenge-prompts-netflix-warn-fans-not-end-up-hospital-due-memes/?utm_term=.fe458227f91b).

(3) A Quiet Place (2018) movie, where the main characters must avoid making sounds in order to survive a terrible threat. I also have not seen this movie yet, but it received very positive reviews. While it is a different sense, it deals with the loss of a "normal" sense modality and dire consequences for doing something that we normally do all the time.

(B) SALVATION: Here are some solutions in how you can resolve the PCs predicament. The one that you choose should ideally be an unexpected outcome of something that the PCs did in the past, which is now resulting in their salvation (or damnation). If you can also tie it into an upcoming plot thread, even better.

(1) Make a Deal with the Devil/Fey/Angel. In desperation, one of your players calls for help and an extra-planar being answers. The PCs must chose to die or to accept the offer without knowing who is offering help (or what the creature wants in return). And, remember, the only thing worse than a deal with the devil (or fey) is a deal with an Angel. The TV show Supernatural can give good examples of that. Bonus points if you use a nearly identical script for each PC, but different Pacts are made with different types of beings. One PC may be offered a deal with an Archdevil, another by an Angel. This would also be a good time for a Warlock Multiclass, if you are playing with a D&D system. Eyes of the Runekeeper would be a good, refluffed Invocation if playing 5e.

(2) The PCs are rescued by Grimlock(s). As an eyeless race, they stumble upon you and take pity on you. They now trust you and take you to their home in the Underdark. A shaman grimlock trains them in the way of blindsight, but with a cost. Hopefully, the PCs also learn some of the "humanity" of Grimlock and realize why they are important for the Underdark ecosystem. The Netflix TV show Daredevil has some great scenes where Stick teaches a sensory overwhelmed Matt Murdock how to navigate with his new powers. Impossible you say, tell that to the real life blind people who ride bicycles (https://www.npr.org/2011/03/13/134425825/human-echolocation-using-sound-to-see). The "How to Become Batman (https://www.npr.org/programs/invisibilia/378577902/how-to-become-batman)" episode of Invisibilia talked about this and training blind kids to find where the soccer field ends and road begins without the use of a cane.

(3) A familiar voice casts Regenerate or Lesser/Greater Restoration on them. This should be a cleric, druid, shaman that they encountered in the past. Ideally, one that they helped without anticipation of reward or one who they scorned.

(4) Somehow the PCs learn the ability to cast Find Familiar. They can now see out of the Familiar's eyes instead of their own...at the cost of their action each turn. If they use their action to see through the familiar's eyes every turn, they will not reach shelter in time. If they do not use it at all, they will wander aimlessly.

noob
2019-01-13, 11:55 AM
If the players does not care much about the characters just letting the characters die can be alright.

D+1
2019-01-13, 01:11 PM
"Dorothy, wake up."

Seriously I'm very opposed to going the direct deus ex machina route. If you want them dead at this point, they're dead. Doesn't much matter how. If you want them to at least have a chance to live then you need to provide SOME options for survival and getting out. I don't care at all for the idea of just having the voodoo lady show up and save them. That's exactly the kind of d.e.m. I hate. But you can have them meet someone/something that will at least BEGIN to give them options to survive rather than just save them then and there. They meet someone who is opposed to the spellcaster. Even if he can't heal the blindness or wipe out the spellcaster he could at least lead them to shelter. Then the PC's can ask where the hell they are in relation to someplace or someone else that might be able to help them or lead them on the next leg to safety and recovery. Or they stumble onto some place that provides shelter. An old hunters cabin or ruins of some kind. In the ruin is a ghost who provides a cryptic clue to a hidden stash of food, or a chant that will summon some other dangerous supernatural entity - but one that MIGHT be bargained with to heal ONE of the party, or polymorph one of them into a bird who can then go scouting, or for a price the entity leads them to some other ruined temple where there is further help or opportunity to keep them on the course to rescue.

The PC's should still need to WORK for their rescue from the situation. You just need to give them options that CAN work, and you can start with just ONE free step TOWARDS safety, not just give them a get-out-jail-free card.

Grog Logs
2019-01-13, 02:10 PM
...But you can have them meet someone/something that will at least BEGIN to give them options to survive rather than just save them then and there...The PC's should still need to WORK for their rescue from the situation. You just need to give them options that CAN work, and you can start with just ONE free step TOWARDS safety, not just give them a get-out-jail-free card.

If you think that your Players can get behind this, this is brilliant. Make them work 1-2 sessions while blind but no longer in imminent risk of death and 2-4 additional sessions receiving some form of sight back. Maybe, if you're feeling nice (or the logistics of game play are difficult), they can get a temporary version of sight back that is time limited. This would put pressure on them to act quickly to get permanent sight back.

Joethegoblin
2019-01-13, 08:44 PM
Thanks for both constructive and hilarious comments!

We just completed a session and i feel compelled to share with you guys, as many of you gave inspiration, and most of you ensured hilarity.
I used the vanilla rules on how blind character work with one adage. I would take away most of their dice rolls. So every time someone had to/wanted to do a skill check or had to do a save, i would ask them what their bonus is and roll it myself and describe what happened. This made the session very tense and promoted a sense of futility. Especially when they had no idea how well the survival rolls succeeded.
So basically, they spent a good deal of the session wandering around, getting more and more lost, and grinded down by the freezing cold. I crafted sort of a condition track (inspired by the condition track in Star Wars Saga Edition). If they failed a fortitude save they travelled further down on the track. fatigue, exhausted, cold damage, constitution damage and sorts.

The last moment of the last session, one of the players stated he fires his musket (Theme is Late Medival Faerun. in D&D 3.5). We ended there.
That player missed the session due to being sick. I asked him for whom the bullet was for, he said for himself.
The first casualty.
They left the corpse kept on walking without finding anything they could call a proper shelter. After blindly stumbling and having no idea where they were going. Two of them fell into a freezing pond. By the time the found a cliff that would at least shield them from the wind, one of the group was down to 4 constitution score, and had passed out on two occasions. The paired up and crawled into bedrolls.
As they went to sleep I asked for their character sheets. I rolled on the "cold condition track!, wrote little notes on how much they suffered during the night, so they would instantly calculate it together, so they could count it all together in an instant to see if they could wake up the following day.
(Sidenote: I have a house rule which states it is forbidden to say your current hitpoint status, or whether your character is dead or alive).

During that, I secretly rolled will saves (randomly picked) and the two first who would fail, i wrote on their damage note they should stand up and go into the kitchen. I followed them, shut the door, and informed then their characters were possessed by spirits.(one of them was the eye popping Ranger) This isn´t out of the blue, without them knowing, these spirits are the "droids they are looking for" They had some special characteristics, including one had tremorsense, the other had scent.
All of them woke up the following morning. All worse for wear, but all alive. the possessed characters, the Ranger and the Scout got directions to act a bit off. The spirits had access to their memories, but they wouldn´t be able to play the character the same as there is someone else in the drivers seat.

So off they went. The possessed knew exactly where they were going, and fairly soon they suspected something was off. It wasn´t until after some travel they started hearing woodchopping, as they drew nearer, they heard a voice speaking in Orcish.
"Took you long enough. Get them inside!"
The possessed characters began talking to them in Orcish. Some of the non possessed party members spoke Orcish and the jig was up. The non-possessed began to attack the others as well as they could, and a hilarious brawl broke out. They were all tied together with a rope so they wouldn´t lose each other, or if someone walked into some hazard they could pull them out. There was some friendly hack ´n´slashery. The Rogue managed to damage the Ranger quite severely in a grapple where the Ranger had the upper hand. Badly enough that I allowed him a second will save against the possession. The Ranger used the opportunity to attack the Scout which was still possessed. He was wildly aware of the possession. He basically to the back seat and watched it all happen. Even though the spirit was no longer in control, it was still in there, so he retained the Tremorsense.
The Rogue stood up from the grapple, and got hit by the cleric by accident and the cleric managed to knock him out. The Ranger was in a fight for his life against the Scout, and he wound up shooting the Scout dead. Using the tremorsense he could see the enemy woodcutter drawing near on them, informed the cleric, and also informed him that the Rogue lay unconscious at his feet.
The cleric had time to heal the Rogue (the one that has only 4 constitution score), the Ranger gathered up the three musket pistols. He knew one of the was loaded, but had no idea which. He gave it to them, and charged.
That he did, landed a hefty blow, but received a hefty blow which put him to the ground. The cleric shot in the general direction of the noise, and quite miraculously managed to hit (it was absurd). But not enough to fell the creature.
The Rogue ran towards it, and against all odds, struck true, but it was a weak blow. The cold exhaustion had reduced him to an empty shell.
The enemy struck back and killed the Rogue with one blow. Though it did not need much.
He could hear the thump. Escalus the Cleric (The Unseeing?) ran for it. He had no idea where he was going. The rules state when blind you can only move at 50% speed, I allowed him to exceed that, with a balance check.
He ran, but fell,he stood up and ran again in a panic. The second time he rose he perked his ears and could hear the enemy running through the snow, a short distance away. The Cleric raised his sword and readied himself. Only with the power of hearing he managed to strike and strike true.
But it was not enough.
The blow that followed put him to the ground.
By that time the Ranger asked me an OOC question about his stabilization checks. He managed to stabilize, then I looked at his character sheet. When he was felled he was at 0HP. Of course in d&d 3.5 you do not instantly fall down at 0 HP. You get partial actions, and if you perform something "strenuous enough you go down to -1 hp. Or ofcourse you can choose to simply fall down and be stabilized. He had forgotten that rule
So he had some time.
He stated he wanted to get one of the musket pistols, reload, and fire at the foe. Which he could roughly see through the tremorsense.
He had enough actions for the time it took for the enemy to bring the cleric down and get back to the Ranger to reload the pistol.
As the enemy drew on him, the Ranger managed to open fire, his aim was true, an fell unconscious.

At that time, we had a short break. I went to the toilet, went for a cigarette, the boys were chatting. Then I called for Escalus the Cleric. Cleric of Walkur, the Captain of the Waves.
"You see yourself in the ocean. Not a land in sight. You lay out in the ocean, calm and serene. Every once in a while, you go under, but are always pulled back up. This state continues back and forth, it feels like days. Then finally, a voice rumbles from the deep."
"Wake up."
He wakes up, completely parched, stomach severely empty. He knew, he was out for days.
He could feel the stench of death around him, but at least it was warm. He could hear a voice. He knew the voice, but he could not understand what it was saying.
It was Kali the Ranger. She was speaking in tongues. Specifically Orcish. But he did not speak the savage language, but recognized it. (At this point, I had taken over the character. I will not go into details as the players in the group are possibly reading this post). Though he could not see, he could hear she was very sluggish, and her voice was too, frantically speaking and moving back and forth. He played dead. She came close to him jibbering, and but said one word she could understand, a name more specifically.
"Blaine" (the Rogue)
She lifted something up from next to him, and the stench of death lessened. She slammed the Rogue on a table, and began cutting him down and put his meat into the cauldron.
At this point, the cleric began very silently to pray to Valkur. Valkur bestows her spells to the clergy during morning.
It was morning.
The empty shell of the Ranger did not pick up on it. After she cut down the Rogue, she went out for firewood, then came back in, took the remains of the Scout. Turned her into meat, and went out for more firewood.
By the time she was back, Valkur had bestowed new spells on her.
Escalus rose up, and in desperation cast Dispel Magic at the Kali the Ranger.
It failed.
We rolled for Initiative, the Cleric won the roll.
Fight!
Escalus summoned a Celestial Eagle to attack the Ranger. The shell of Kali had a weirdly hard time with defeating it. Escalus then cast upon himself Detect Evil in an effort to be actually able to see her. (Strictly speaking, you need eyes for Detect Evil to work, but I allowed it in a distorted sense)
The Celestial Eagle was slain and Escalus was the target. Escalus tried to Enthrall Kali. He failed and got punched in the face. With only 1 hit point left, he tried again, and succeeded.
He had an hour. He asked his "thrall" to escort him to the direction of the town for an half an hour (half the duration of the spell) and then go back.
When they parted ways, leaving Escalus a sword.
The sword was not for fighting, it was used as a cane to prevent him from stumbling into something unwanted.
So he kept on wandering in his own darkness, the sole survivor.
He was severely sick, pushed to his own limits. All sense of time and direction long gone. Afraid that Kali might return before he got to safety, or for the freezing cold would get him first.

Then he would hear a wood chopping sound.
Very similar to the one before.
He stood there for a bit, then ultimately decided to walk towards it, and call out for help.
As he walked closer he heard multible chopping sounds, and before he knew it, several loggers from Redmoor came to his assistance.
They got him back to Redmoor, tended to his wounds. They tried to pry more information out of him, but he was too delirious for it.
So they tucked him into bed for him to rest, and the villagers sent a carrier pigeon back to the colony capital, Port Redmire for backup. As them, the group were the ones in Redmoot that were supposed to deal with situations like these.
We ended the session with a "cinematic" back in Port Redmire. Where Governor Goodfellow sat at his office, talking to a group of adventurers, giving them an assignment to travel to Redmoor...

And by the way, Escalus will stay as a player character. Escalus the unseeing.

I feel like I should give him some cool perk for surviving the ordeal.
What should I do for him?
(It´s out of the question to make him a level higher than the others. I do not use the XP system, and as a policy, the group is always the same level)

Metahuman1
2019-01-14, 04:35 AM
Have a decently high level Druid wander into town and restore his vision (cause seriously, he only lost it cause someone else, who isn't having to suffer the consequences of that action anymore, blew it big time.), and give him something nifty like a Roc Egg or a Pet Dinosaur or something.

Then the druid leaves the following morning to return to going off to deal with what he/she was originally out in the middle of no were in route too.



Or have the Clerics Deity decide to cut him a break since he's proven himself potentially rather an asset for the Deity's cause on the material plane. Fix the eyes, and drop some manner or custom Relic or Artifact in the clerics lap. Maybe a custom Legacy Item or something. (Not one of the pre-printed ones, there horrible.). Give it some cool powers, maybe maybe it sentient and able to use those powers once given general directions.

Or have the Cleric's Deity fix his eyes and bestow a Template, or maybe even a race change to something obscure and exotic and normally cost prohibitive, too the priest, as part of the fix. But do it with out the draw backs this normally imposes like LA or racial hit dice or whatever. If your worried about power, pick one that's useful but that your comfortable with, maybe one of the famously over priced for what you get one's.




Or have there have been something else that watched what happened, and has decided to follow him of it's own accord. A particularly exotic dragon or a Drow follower of Ellistree or however you spell the good aligned Drow goddesses name or a wandering Minotaur or Giant or something who's an outcast. They saw enough of what happened to feel they should follow this mortal/find this mortal intriguing/feel there deity wishes them to follow this mortal for a time or whatever. Treat it like the leadership feat, but you get to build the cohort as a monster cohort or whatever.

Or if that's too much, maybe just a random wandering Barbarian Swordswoman (Perhaps with like the Jotenbroad feat and/or a template or something for Powerful Build or Large Size.) or Star Elf Minstral or something more normal by way of a free scaling cohort.




He's not a higher level, but for surviving another players idiocy, he still gets something nice. And something that will scale with him as he keeps playing this character and time keeps moving on in game, cause, well, he went through something I'd have probably rage quit. He deserves something nice that will stay nice.

ForzaFiori
2019-01-14, 07:29 AM
I would say honestly, if the character wants to be Escalus "the Unseeing," you either need to give him blindsight, or when you restore his sight, somehow keep the "no eyeballs" thing, so it at least looks like he's blind. Otherwise people are gonna be confused by the name. :smalltongue: Maybe talk to the player, or use your knowledge of them, to decide if they'd prefer the more roleplaying boon, or the full sight. Maybe give them an ability to make blindsight go out farther to be more useful. Especially once you get your party back, it's not massively important that everyone can see to the horizon, or see in color.

Obviously, this is in addition to some sort of other boon/artifact/item to actually reward him. Just my 2cp that if I had managed to survive blind and picked up that nickname, I'd kinda want my character to get blindsight and turn into daredevil rather than just go back to normal. Otherwise it's like you did all that work just to hit a rewind button.

Edit - If he goes for the blindsight you could also be nice by making the extra thing he gets a little better to make up for it - just don't let the player know there were two options on that end if you talk to them about the sight thing.

ATHATH
2019-01-14, 02:43 PM
What happened to the spirit(s) from the box?

noob
2019-01-14, 02:55 PM
What happened to the spirit(s) from the box?

they still wander around exploding more eyes.

Korith
2019-01-14, 03:03 PM
Makes me think of this xkcd: Unquote (https://www.xkcd.com/1262/)

Alternatively - Ten Thousand (https://xkcd.com/1053/)

GreatWyrmGold
2019-01-14, 03:23 PM
(2) The PCs are rescued by Grimlock(s). As an eyeless race, they stumble upon you and take pity on you.
For some reason, my mind went straight to "They can't see, so they don't realize the surface-dwellers are missing their eyes, hilarity ensues".


I second the "reward the survivor with Daredevil powers" option.

Quertus
2019-01-14, 08:19 PM
Personally, I'd give him a 1/day rewind time, slap someone on the head, and say, "don't do that!" ability.

paddyfool
2019-01-15, 01:00 PM
Personally, I'd give him a 1/day rewind time, slap someone on the head, and say, "don't do that!" ability.

Don't do this. You (hopefully) taught your players a lesson on the subjects of preparing for wilderness survival, playing with dangerous toys and letting the ranger's player have dangerous toys to play with. And gave the surviving character some interesting development. Where you go with his eyeless state now is your dilemma now, unless you choose to make it the player's.

Joethegoblin
2019-01-15, 11:22 PM
What happened to the spirit(s) from the box?

Returned back to the realm they were captured from...
For now!

Quertus
2019-01-16, 11:01 PM
Don't do this. You (hopefully) taught your players a lesson on the subjects of preparing for wilderness survival, playing with dangerous toys and letting the ranger's player have dangerous toys to play with. And gave the surviving character some interesting development. Where you go with his eyeless state now is your dilemma now, unless you choose to make it the player's.

Oh, I didn't mean to undo this particular event; rather, to undo future bouts of stupidity. IME, players that can Ranger the party will likely Ranger the party repeatedly. Seems a shame to lose this cool character, Escalus the Unseeing, to the next bout of stupidity, IMO.

GreatWyrmGold
2019-01-17, 02:02 AM
Oh, I didn't mean to undo this particular event; rather, to undo future bouts of stupidity. IME, players that can Ranger the party will likely Ranger the party repeatedly. Seems a shame to lose this cool character, Escalus the Unseeing, to the next bout of stupidity, IMO.
I don't think it's fair to use "Ranger" as a verb from probably only one bout of fairly minor stupidity.
(My group uses one of its former members as a metaphor for stupidity, but trust me, he's made a lot of stupid decisions in his time. The funniest was probably when he threw a vindictive psychopath at a fleeing enemy after repeatedly turning down free guns. Anyways, it's possible that he's distorted my perception of what stupidity is "minor".)

Wraith
2019-01-17, 06:28 AM
I would just like to say, joethegoblin, that I think you handled the original crisis in the best way possible.

You had all the reason to just let the players die and start over, but instead you gave them a chance to play the game in a new way. You gave them a chance to atone for their mistake, you let them try to solve it with skills and you let them try to save themselves with dice - surely appreciated by the players/characters who might be more comfortable with one rather than the other.

Everything that happened to the party seems justified, usually caused by their own short-sightedness (pun not intended) and everyone was given a chance to save both themselves and the party. And most importantly of all, it sounds very much like you made several slow, painful and prolonged deaths sound like a lot of fun.

Bravo. :smallsmile:

Quertus
2019-01-17, 12:44 PM
I don't think it's fair to use "Ranger" as a verb from probably only one bout of fairly minor stupidity.
(My group uses one of its former members as a metaphor for stupidity, but trust me, he's made a lot of stupid decisions in his time. The funniest was probably when he threw a vindictive psychopath at a fleeing enemy after repeatedly turning down free guns. Anyways, it's possible that he's distorted my perception of what stupidity is "minor".)

It's only unfair if he doesn't do it again, which is the premise of the power. :smalltongue:

As the reference is from what was once my favorite movie (now probably just top 10), I know that I'm biased.

Metahuman1
2019-01-19, 11:18 PM
I wonder if the OP is going to post here to let us know what Reward he settled on?

King of Nowhere
2019-01-20, 02:34 AM
I wonder how the ranger did open the box without warning the others. I mean, I can envision the dialogue at the table
"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
"ok, i assume you all close your eyes?"
"no, the other guys don't close your eyes, because I'm not telling them".

or

"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
other player: "hey, wait a minute. it may be a good idea, but let's talk about it before"
"nope. I just open it without telling anyone

or even

"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
other players: play with mobile / look tv / sleep / talk about somehting unrelated
DM: "are you fine with what he's doing?"
other players: "huh? what?"
DM: "ok. make a saving throw against eye exploding"

But seriously, I maintain that the main responsible is the which. the "vague warning" is one of the narrative tropes that make me want to hit the characters with a baseball bat.
You either are trying to help, in which case you don't omit details that may kill people out of ignorance, or you are not trying to help, in which case you may as well not bother.
"open in your hour of need" did totally qualify for the swamp survival scene. As far as everyone knew, it could be a call for help. If I were the players, I'd make "kill the witch" the next quest. And if she gives the "my help is not given lightly", then even more, because that's playing with lives. Again, you either want to help, or you get out of the way.

EDIT: in general, while a DM may expect players to instinctively follow archetypes, or to "know" that those are the best way to proceed, it is not something to be taken for granted, because those very archetypes are basically glorified clichès. As far as the players know, the DM is trying to subvvert them for the sake of doing something different, or just to appeal to his tastes or because he likes the different scenario better.

I am reminded of the Mistborn trilogy, where there are prophecies telling the protagonist what to do, and she follows the prophecies, and in the end she discovers that those prophecies were planted by the evil overlord to trick a hero into releasing it.

So, "this reminds me of indiana jones, we should totally act like this box works like the lost ark" is not a good argument, and it is not the argument I'd want my players to make.

GreatWyrmGold
2019-01-20, 12:10 PM
I wonder how the ranger did open the box without warning the others. I mean, I can envision the dialogue at the table
I'd imagine that it was likely more of a "lack of dialogue at the table" situation.

Joethegoblin
2019-01-22, 12:22 AM
I wonder how the ranger did open the box without warning the others. I mean, I can envision the dialogue at the table
"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
"ok, i assume you all close your eyes?"
"no, the other guys don't close your eyes, because I'm not telling them".

or

"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
other player: "hey, wait a minute. it may be a good idea, but let's talk about it before"
"nope. I just open it without telling anyone

or even

"ok, we are in our hour of need, so i open the box"
other players: play with mobile / look tv / sleep / talk about somehting unrelated
DM: "are you fine with what he's doing?"
other players: "huh? what?"
DM: "ok. make a saving throw against eye exploding"



He made the decision to open it, stated it. To me, not to the group. I asked him if he wants to share that information with the group. He said "no I just open it. Rest of the group were trying to get his attention to give him a hint without saying it outright. He claims he forgot it, and I belive him. The player isn´t a ****.



I wonder if the OP is going to post here to let us know what Reward he settled on?


Yes I intend to do so. But I will after the next session (on wednesday). Because some of the party members travel these halls. So no spoilers for them!

King of Nowhere
2019-01-22, 05:07 AM
He made the decision to open it, stated it. To me, not to the group. I asked him if he wants to share that information with the group. He said "no I just open it. Rest of the group were trying to get his attention to give him a hint without saying it outright. He claims he forgot it, and I belive him. The player isn´t a ****.



huh, that's crazy; what reason would he have to not share information with the party?

Although I'm probably biased because my group is mixed alignment and so, to avoid stepping on each other's toes, we never do anything major without a lot of deliberation, both in character and out of character (to ensure that there are no hurt feelings, especially when some character has to accept actions that he would not condone otherwise and we have to look for reasons he could possibly accept).
So the idea of someone just doing something like that is alien to me

GreatWyrmGold
2019-01-23, 11:24 AM
huh, that's crazy; what reason would he have to not share information with the party?
When someone in my group does something like that, they generally have an in-character reason (generally something like "They don't think the group would care" or "There isn't enough time" or "They don't realize this matters"*). Dunno enough about the ranger and the situation to speculate beyond that.


*It's pretty normal for at least one character in my gaming group's parties to be a moron. A bit less so now that the most common accidental offender stopped coming...

Metahuman1
2019-01-27, 02:14 AM
Yes I intend to do so. But I will after the next session (on wednesday). Because some of the party members travel these halls. So no spoilers for them!

Wednesday has come and gone. Will we be getting the update soon? I wish to know what happened. =)