Journey Through The Silver Caves: Worldwide D&D Gameday Experiences

[Bigbrother87]

I'm really surprised that I haven't seen a thread for this yet. If there is one, I apologize, but since I haven't seen one, here it is.

Tomorrow, the 23rd, is Worldwide D&D Game Day, for the release of the Monster Manual 2, in other words, WWDDGD: MM2 Go to a game/comics store, play DnD for fun with no preparation needed on your part? Sounds great to me.

I decided to actually start this thread to discuss the adventure and your experiences in it, because tomorrow I'll finally be able to play some 4e at an actual table, with dice, rather than just online. Plus, one of my friend's will also be joining me, yay!

The above link has the following information about the adventure:

Journey Through the Silver Caves – A kobold wyrmpriest has stolen an ancient book of prophecy from the people of Albura, a fortress on the borderlands. The kobold has a dark plan for the book – and only you can stop him in time! An adventure for 5 pregenerated 5th-level characters.

We (meaning me, my friend, and everyone else who plays it tomorrow), will be playing one of the the following characters:

* Uthal: Goliath Barbarian
* Althaea: Eladrin Wizard
* Arjhana: Dragonborn Rogue
* Chance: Tiefling Warlord
* Eomer: Dwarf Paladin

I'm trying not to set my hopes on any particular character tomorrow, not knowing which will already be claimed and such, but I have read and reread the character sheets in preparation for anything.

A question though, what's the use for the abilities of Uthal's Dynamic Greatsword and Eomer's Dynamic Craghammer? A hammer and a greatsword are already what they're good at, so why give them weapons that can be changed into other weapons?

Also, someone on Twitter said that this adventure was

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about three combat encounters and a skill challenge

in length, about how long does that usually take to play?

[Haven]

I went to this today. It was actually my first time playing 4th edition--I made a Dragonborn Paladin of the Raven Queen, and though keeping track of the modifiers was confusing sometimes, that can be said of any edition. The party consisted of myself, Althaea, Chance, and a Swordmage.

I liked my role in the party--throwing around heals and smiting baddies. I also like the fact that there was no ethical quandary involved in running away and leaving everyone to die when Rust Monsters became involved. :D Eventually I killed one with my bare fists (though not after it ate my armor--I argued, to no avail, that resisting necrotic damage should make it rustproof), and burned its corpse as a sacrifice to my god. Mwahaha.
(Incidentally, I learned that residuum is actually what rust monsters crap. Bwah?)

Also, I tried to intimidate some ghosts and got a 30. But because the module only mentioned Bluff and Diplomacy checks, it didn't work.
But...a 30. Bah.

The last battle was extremely close (though hilariously, the Eye of Gruumsh wasted like three turns trying to scale a damn wall). I just kept unloading like mad on the wyrm priest, filled with righteous anger at this act of hubris and defamation to both the Raven Queen and dragonkind. Or at least that's what I figured my critical hit with power attack and the lightning sword daily and etc etc etc that did over thirty damage was about.
There was also a great moment where the eladrin fireballed the bridge, that the wyrmpriest was standing on, and I said "I bet she can fly because of that dragon ritual". As it turned out...

But yeah, good times. It wasn't exactly an epic adventure--just killing some monsters--but it was a great intro to 4th for me. I enjoyed the game's emphasis on tactics and teamwork; the marking system was great, and making Lay On Hands a minor action meant that it got a lot more use.

As for the other parties: apparently there was actually a TPK in the rust monster fight! Even worse: at one of the other tables an Eladrin used fey step to get into the ritual room and grabbed the book. She tried to cast a ritual from it which was above her level...botched the roll horribly...and ended up in the Nine Hells.

[Bigbrother87]

Sounds like you had a much more...unique, time than I did Haven. But I had fun anyway:

Got the store at noon, found out my friend wasn't gonna make it cause he had to work, but decided that I wouldn't let that ruin it for me.

Got in there, and it was...dead. I mean, really. It didn't pick up till this group of about 7 showed up for a Warhammer 40k game. Nobody showed at that store wanting to play till about 2, though another of their stores apparently had a full turn out.

So we get started, me, running the Wizard and the Warlord, another player running the Barbarian and the Rogue, and the DM running the Paladin till someone else came around 3 or 4 and was willing to join (all the Warhammer40k tables were full :) )

The first encounter didn't really have anything of note, though the Goliath did run full out to try and prevent the wyrmpriest from escaping...Didn't work, that Harpy's hard to kill.

The second encounter was...definitely more interesting and involving, tactically, anyway. The third player had arrived and was providing excellent advice about who fights what. Lots of flanking going on, plus excellent combination of the Paladin's marking and the Warlord's attack that forces the enemy to attack the Warlord, then another character to attack it, thus taking the radiant damage from the mark.

There was a beautiful moment where we'd just taken down the 1st Rust Monster, and the party was set up like this:

xxR
xMx
WxB
xPx

x=space, R=Rogue, M=Rust Monster, W=Warlord, B=Barbarian and P=Paladin.

The Rust Monster is marked, and the Paladin was role playing bait, perfectly, all decked out in his armor and looking mighty tasty. The Dm rolled for the Rust Monster's intelligence, to see if he realized moving forward=OA from the Rogue AND obvious flanking from the Warlord and Barbarian. It didn't, ran forward for a bite, and the Rogue stabbed it through the skull, killing it dead. Most awesome moment of the day.

The most Almost-Awesome moment of the day had happened just a little earlier. My wizard, seeing an opportunity to cause major damage to a Rust monster and the construct, threw a fireball down behind them, trying to the be careful and avoid the warlord...Those Rust monster's are NIMBLE little bugs...Both it and the construct dodged, and only received half damage. I'm thinking "Ok, half damage. This is 3d6+whatever, they'll be hurting anyway" It was 9. Total, not half. They took half of 9. My head would have hit the table, except that would have disturbed the figures...

More role playing happened during the skill challenge. One instance was where the Paladin rolled badly for direction, and my wizard rolled well.

P: Um, I think that way (thumb pointing back the way we'd come) is the right way.
Me: The Eladrin holds her head in her hands before saying "No, it's that way, the river flows that way, the signs point that way, and we go that way. Please pay no attention to this dwarf"

The second player had to leave before the last encounter really got started, so player three took over the Rogue and the Barbarian, as well as the Paladin he was already playing. Turns out, Goliath Barbarians take a lot of damage. My warlord used both Inspiring words, in consecutive turns, and his ability that when a character is reduced to zero, he attacks the enemy that did the deed and the dead character can use a healing surge. So, that was our only death, and it lasted about 1.5 seconds. :)

The wizard, yeah, she has a lot of good area attacks. Unfortunately, my Warlord was right before her in the Initiative, and kept having to get in her striking area to attack. I finally gave in and took advantage of his resistance to 7 fire damage and just got him and two orcs.

Orc one attack roll: 11
Orc two attack roll: 13
Warlord attack roll: 23

Yes, he was fried for...6 points of damage. RESISTED! :)

Then the wyrmpriest ascended... uhoh.

A big moment happened during that fight, and it was awesome. So, Warlord's turn, he's at a corner of the wyrmpriest's square, the barbarian is behind him.

The Warlord uses Wolf pack tactics, and moves the Barbarian forward, next to him, so he'd be able to attack. I missed that attack, but then, ACTION POINT, and used the ability where he attacks, the enemy attacks him, another character attacks enemy. I attack, and then the DM notices that the wyrmpriest just became bloodied...All Hell broke loose.

Now Dazed AND having taken 5 cold damage, the characters regroup and continue the attack, but how that all happened to chaotically? Awesome.

Wyrmpriest goes down, and the spoils are divvied up. I mean that literally. That had been the only game at that shop, but they had three copies of it, so because I waited patiently for people to show up, I got all five characters, the blood drakes, the rust monsters, the wyrmpriest, the scarabs, the map and the adventure, plus the new pack of dice they'd opened for the game...It was like Christmas.

So, that was my Worldwide D&D Game Day experience and story, what's yours?

[AlterForm]

My table was fun, but after reading some other experiences I think we got Easy Mode or our DM fudged a bit.

Encounter 1: Wyrmpriest, Orcs, Drakes, and Harpy

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1 of 2 hilarious moments in the delve. The flavor text for the room as the party enters read something to the effect of "you see before you a stealthy drake..." The moment the DM read that he paused, then everyone burst out laughing at the "stealthy" drake everyone could see.

The battle was rather straightforward. The Paladin, Warlord, and Rogue took on the orcs and one of the drakes. I (the Barbarian) and the Wizard jumped and teleported up the slope to deal with Drake #2. He was popped by a Magic Missile. I then proceeded to splatter the kobold wyrmpriest against the wall in 1 round.

Harpy sings, takes the MacGuffin...I mean the book...then flies off to never be seen again. Seriously, wtf?

Encounter 2: Rust Monsters!

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Funny moment 2. We had some young (~10 yrs old) players at the table. When the DM pulled out the minis for the Scarab-thingies, one of them called it a ladybug. 3 guess what we called them for the rest of the encounter.

The backup weapon we were given came in handy in this encounter. I rolled a nat 20 (total 29) to ID the RMs, so I dropped my backup and the DM took one of the RMs out of the fight for 4 rounds while it munched it down. "uthar smart!" The rogue almost fed his magical dagger to one of the RMs.

We transitioned to the SC by the Rogue performing acrobatic leaps down the cliff face (nat 20 Acrobatics for a total around 26). I proceed to swing out, slam my sword into the wall, then walldrag my way down (nat 20 Athletics for a total 34).

Skill Challenge: Raftin'

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I have no idea how the skill challenge was constructed. I have no idea what the DCs were. I have no idea what skills were actually designed in and which the DM ad'hoc'd for us.

And I liked it.

This, IMO, is how a SC should be played out. Multiple stages, multiple skills, rather freeform, and only just enough structure to let players know they can't "just RP it."

The Wizard picked up a pair of Boots of Striding, which he promptly passed to me (we buddied up real quick after E1 ). They came in handy in the next encounter.

Encounter 4: Big Showdown

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The Wizard and Warlord went straight towards the main room from the raft, staying stealthy.
I and the Rogue cut left, both of us promptly rolling 20s on Athletics checks to cross the water (thank you racial traits), and evaded detection.
The Paladin pulled a Durkon and loudly announced our arrival.

The party runs in, I jump/slide down the slope as my Ultra-Beefy Self only can, and we pummel one of the orcs into submission on round 1. The 2 left whiff both attacks. The Wizard puts out a stinking cloud, putting out the pain. We take down orc 2. Orc 3 whiffs. Dragonthingy (some name we decided was unimportant for remembering) shows up. Rogue and Dragonthingy run off to do...stuff. Rest of us finish up the last orc. Rogue's in bad shape. I vault down some stairs, leap some rubble, then charge up some more stairs, chopping the Dragonthingy down to bloodied. This was only made possible by those boots the Wizard found and my Lightning Panther (or somesuch) rage. Next turn, we mop up.

We than take the conveniently placed teleportation circle back to town, have a banquet thrown in our honor, then wreck the place as per the adventuring party's backstory. Hooray.

Combat: Summary

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Barbarian played better than I expected. With super-Athletics and a racial ability that promotes it, he wound up all but ignoring difficult terrain.
THP were my main method of staying alive. Unfortunately, I only earned a grand total of about 15 over the entire delve. Throughout the whole day, I hit bloodied about 4 times and spent barely half my healing surges.
The Rogue in the last battle was the only other PC to take any notable damage.

No one dropped below 0. Ever.

Rages are fun.

I have but one gripe. I didn't receive a new d20 this year.
I did get the rather-topheavy Goliath mini, though.

[RTGoodman]

Wyrmpriest goes down, and the spoils are divvied up. I mean that literally. That had been the only game at that shop, but they had three copies of it, so because I waited patiently for people to show up, I got all five characters, the blood drakes, the rust monsters, the wyrmpriest, the scarabs, the map and the adventure, plus the new pack of dice they'd opened for the game...It was like Christmas.

I would love to take part in one of these Game Days, but there aren't ANY gaming stores within, oh, an hour or so of here. Eh, at least I'll be back to college in the Fall, with TWO gaming stores in town!


@AlterForm: That sounds like a pretty neat little adventure. I'll have to see if I can find it online at some point, if only to read that River Raftin' skill challenge.

[AlterForm]

Yeah, it was pretty neat. There were pretty much 3 stages:

1: Forest tributaries that crisscrossed every which way. The party is riding on a sabotaged raft, down a series of labyrinthine streams, with a wet map, in unfamiliar woods, trying to keep track of an escaped Orc from one of the earlier areas.
2: Cave rivers where the party has to navigate some subterranean (I think) caverns similar to the previous area. Early in this stage we encountered a stretch of ghost-induced-rapids where we temporarily lost the rogue and I held the raft together with my bare hands. Fun times.
3: Passageway into the realms of the Nareth(sp?). We had to talk our way through a pair (or maybe a group?) of ghosts (?) to proceed. I wrapped it up with a nat-20 diplomacy; "uthal promise not steal from ghost-graves!" *tear rolls down cheek*

[Elder Wraith]

This was my first time playing D&D, period.

Having read up on it beforehand (in D&D for Dummies) I arrived to take control of Chance, Tiefling warlord. However, someone had to leave early, so I took over Arjhana, the Dragon Born rouge.

In the first encounter, absolutely nothing interesting happened. I was learning to play, that's all.

Second encounter, we only saw the Ballista. My warlord and rouge crept around the side while Operation Meat Shield charged up the centre. Then we saw the rust monsters and scarabs. I kept getting immobilised, and my rouge missed with a Brutal Strike daily power (in a sneak attack position). We finally killed the scarab, but the Paladin was cornered by the rust monsters. some jammy rolling later, and he only took a minus two too his AC. Every time the Ballista shot, Paladin got a Opportunity attack, and the Ballista missed.

The Skill challenge was entertaining, but it was the final encounter that rocked. Several entertaining things happened - Arjhana crept off to steal the book, while the rest of us attacked the orcs. However, Arjhana ended up fighting the Wyrmpriest (I have GOT to get a copy of the stats for that thing) before the wizard (forgot her name) blew the bridge down with a Scorching burst. Meanwhile, in the men's corner, The Goliath was fighting one orc, the paladin another, and Chance was... well, I threw myself off a ridge (Nat 20 athletics, woot!) and rammed into the Eye of Gruumsh, getting a Critical hit. However, things went downhill, and finished in a TPK. Ouch.

Still, it was one of the most enjoyable experiences of my life.

[RTGoodman]

However, things went downhill, and finished in a TPK. Ouch.

Ouch - what a way to start off a gaming career. I've been playing for, gosh, six years or so by now, and I've only ever had ONE character death, and have yet to see a TPK. (Well, actually, I've had two character deaths, but it was the same character in one game, so, you know, that's close enough to just being one.)

I hope you intend to keep playing. If you've got any questions, I know there're a ton of folks here in the Playground that'd be happy to answer 'em!

[Uin]

Notes from the session:

I was all set to run for the event, however we lacked players so I was added as a 6th in another game. 6 players in a 1 shot event game is a bad idea!

I played the warlord hoping to try out some tactical shenanigans. Unfortunately the warlord's chosen powers were the poorer at-wills and reactive encounters and dailies, the conditions of which never came up (nor would you want them to). Dull session for me.

Our DM made a good stab at it (he deserves kudos actually), but we had a kid and a stoner at the table.

Saying that, the adventure itself could have been decent its just that circumstances conspired against us.

[Elder Wraith]

I hope you intend to keep playing. If you've got any questions, I know there're a ton of folks here in the Playground that'd be happy to answer 'em!

Yes and yes. How does a lv5 Dragonborn rouge manage to nearly kill a dragon-kobold-wizard-thing without help, only for a Orc to kill it?

[Elder Wraith]

I played the warlord hoping to try out some tactical shenanigans. Unfortunately the warlord's chosen powers were the poorer at-wills and reactive encounters and dailies, the conditions of which never came up (nor would you want them to). Dull session for me.

I know - I got my copy of the PHB1 and found that I could have made a better one myself.

[RTGoodman]

Yes and yes. How does a lv5 Dragonborn rouge manage to nearly kill a dragon-kobold-wizard-thing without help, only for a Orc to kill it?

Eh, sorta depends on the actual enemies. I didn't see the adventure, but I imagine the "dragon-kobold-wizard-thing" was what we call a "Controller" - a kind of enemy that's fragile in combat, but excels in doing a little damage across the battlefield AND hitting its foes with conditions (slowed, weakened, ongoing damage, immobilized, etc.).

The Orc, on the other hand, was probably either a "Brute" or a "Soldier." A Brute is usually a big, strong monster that, while not quite as accurate with attacks, deals massive damage when it connects. A Soldier is more accurate but does slightly less damage, and focuses on fighting one PC at a time, usually.

As a Rogue, you were pretty well suited to take out a Controller - your focus is on damage, and Controllers don't usually have a lot of HP. (Compare it to a PC Wizard.) On the other hand, the orc, as a Soldier or a Brute, is almost DESIGNED to take out things like rogue - you wear lighter armor AND don't have as many HP as, say, a Fighter or Paladin, and that's what Brutes and Soldiers like to see.

Basically, you can kinda think of D&D combat (in 4E, at least) as a little bit like rock-paper-scissors, but more complex. Brute monsters are good against Strikers, but weaker against Defenders (who have more AC and HP). They're okay against Controllers (like Wizards) in melee, but weak against them at range because they typically attack a Brutes weak defenses (his Reflex and Will defenses).

[Elder Wraith]

Oh...okay.

I haven't got a clue what the orc was - it was called a Terrorblade from MM2, but as I only have the original trilogy (don't sue me lucasfilm) I couldn't look it up.
The Kobold-wizard-dragon-thing is a character made just for the game - It's a kobold wyrmpriest that used a ritual to bind the soul of a dead dragon (white, i think) to it. So, it started as a controller but the white dragons a soldier (i think). I'm not sure how you'd classify it.

[Bigbrother87]

Surprisingly...

The Wyrmpriest, in the first combat, is listed as Artillery(Long range attacker), but in the final fight, with the white dragon's soul bound to her, she's listed as an "Elite Brute". The Orc leader is actually listed as the "Elite Controller".

Yeah, I'm surprised too, but I checked the adventure and that's what they're described as.