Campaign Game 3 - Wagons Ho!

Wow - it seems like such a long time since our last campaign game.  This month we are playing Scenario 3 of The Lair of The Lich Lord campaign.  While missing two of our regular players, we did have a guest player - the son of one of our regulars.  We don't get to see him very often due to his work schedule.

The Game

Agarn (Bemis' Apprentice) timidly peeks inside the inn where his Master's rival Sigilist occasionally enjoys a noon time meal.  Seeing the one he is seeking, he cautiously enters and approaches her table.  As he does so, several hands move towards their swords hilts. 

He meekly says, "Mistress Quailelyn, my apologies for interrupting your sustenance.  Master Bemis has sent me to discuss tomorrow's foray into the frozen city.  He assumes you too will be out in the cold since he has heard rumors of such.  In mutual benefit, he asks only that you join him in disrupting any other wizards brave enough to be adventuring as well."

Trying not to appear scared, he continues, "To that end, Master Bemis would like to recommend combining talents to suppress the casting of the following spells:  Bone Dart, Elemental Bolt, Leap, and possibly Fast Act.  He does not request an answer, merely making a suggestion for your consideration."

And with that, Agarn rapidly turns around and flees toward the door.  He yells a quick "Sorry" to the Inn wench as he almost knocks her tray of drinks out of her hand in his haste.  Breathing a sigh of relief as he exits onto the street, he hurries back to the safety of his Master's library.

One end of the table

Sitting down with Nigel (Captain), Bemis goes over the accumulated notes with hints of lost treasure and other rumors gathered up by his trusty warband members, as well as his studies of the papers in his old library base.  A rumor of a stranded wagon train in a remote part of the city catches his interest.  Consulting with Nigel, they decide its worth a trip to find it.  Especially if the talk about a great wealth of gold and magic items are concealed in the wagons.  Bemis says, "Captain, prepare the warband" and goes in search of Agarn.

The other end of the table

Another view of the table

Bemis and his apprentice make attempts to scry out the location of any hidden treasure items that might be found near the stranded wagons but both fail to detect anything (Unsuccessful casts of Reveal Secret).  They are more successful writing scrolls - scrolls of Draining Word and Reveal Secret.  They then successfully cast Familiars for themselves, slightly increasing their health for the trip.

Bemis decides to try out the pair of matching magic amulets they recovered on the last outing (Eyes of Amoto).  They may be useful.  He decides to keep one and gives the matching one to Hatch (Thief).

The morning air is cold and the skies appear to be clear as Bemis and crew head out into the ruins.  With Nigel leading, they take a circuitous route towards their chosen search area.  When they get close, Bemis stops the group.  He pulls out his scroll of Reveal Secret and reads the magic runes on the sheet.  "There is something near an old tomb.  It'll be your job to find it Agarn."  Agarn gulps, "O...okay, Master.  If I must."  I hate graveyards he thought to himself.

Bemis and the Gang

Whether luck or providence, Nigel leads them straight to an old graveyard.  And to the front he can see three wagons stuck in the snow.  As well as 4-5 cultists who look like they are frozen to the bone.  Bemis waves folks into starting position as he scans the area looking for any rivals that may be out today.  The view to the left is almost entirely blocked by ruins.  To the right, he can see shadows off in the distance moving around but can't identify the warband. 

Bemis and the Gang in their jump off positions

Bemis waves his guys forward as he prepares his first spell of the day.  All goes well and a glowing rune appears in the sky (Draining Word).  Any potential adversaries would find it a bit difficult to cast Bone Dart today.  While the other members of the warband move towards the wagons, Agarn is also successful in casting Draining Word.  Another glowing rune appears, this time to hinder the casting of Leap.  While the others more forward, Niko (Thief) heads towards a nearby tower to try and get a better view of the area (Once he finally gets to the top, he finds a chest, grabs it, and heads out of the ruins).

In addition to the movement on the right, Bemis could now see heads peeking out of the ruins to his right front.  He quickly prepared and cast Fog to discourage any missiles or spells coming his way.  Agarn followed suit and a nice wall of Fog protected the right flank.

Nigel and friends move towards a treasure wagon

Piko moved quickly forward and engaged a cultist.  Pongo followed and finished off the cultist with a quick thrust of his sword.  Nigel and Vale jump on top of a wagon and engage a second cultist.  With Vale in support, Nigel quickly dispatches this one as well.

Nigel engages a cultist

Meanwhile, the magic currents were flowing strong.  A glowing rune appeared in the sky - Elemental Bolt.  Quail must be nearby and acting on my suggestion.  Suddenly, it started to snow (Call Storm from Chaffarn).  Small flakes at first but the quickly seemed to get bigger (Chaffarn's Apprentice Aina cast Call Storm).  The storm should keep the danger of missile fire low.
Bemis fails to cast Grenade, causing himself some minor pain in the process (1 damage).  Agarn also attempts to cast Grenade.  While successful, the Grenade fails to cause any damage to his target.
9Toe (Thief), Hatch (Thief), and Shadow (Warhound) rush the wagon to the left front.  9Toe engages the cultist but slips as he does so.  The cultist whacks him up side the head with a mace.  9Toe crumples to the snow  Shadow attacks and quickly takes out the cultist.  Hatch searches the wagon and grabs a small chest.  At the other wagon, Vale rummages around and finds two small chest.  He grabs one and calls to Piko to grab the other.  And the storm increased a bit more (Call Storm from Chaffarn).

About this time, a demon emerges through the Fog.  Chaffarn has been delving into the darks arts again.  The demon joins a growing crowd of henchmen around the third wagon.  Seeing the number of enemy warband members increasing, Bemis attempts to cast Grenade again.  Unfortunately, in his rush, he completely botches the spell (takes another point of damage).

Chaffarn and Missy fighting to recover a treasure

"AGARN" Bemis yells, "Over here" and points towards the demon.  Agarn eyes turned into saucers.  He quickly prepared a spell "don't get it wrong, don't get it wrong" he mumbled.  And then he cast.  The demon let out an unearthly sound as it was released from its binding (Successful cast of Dispel on the demon to remove Bind Demon).  The demon, carrying a treasure chest, turned towards the closest person to him and prepared to attack.  The demon was then mobbed by three of Chaffarn's henchmen and they successfully defeated him, regaining the treasure.  While this was going on, Bemis was motioning for his warband members to return to the graveyard.  More henchmen were rushing through the fog - they belonged to Missy.  She and Chaffarn must be in cahoots.  Some kind of foul sorcery must be at play.  Things did not look good.  As soon as Missy's crossbowmen were through the fog, bolts started to fly.  Fortunately, the storm was having a negative effect of Missy's lads.

Chaffarn and Missy decide Bemis has too much treasure

Shadow moved to put himself between his warband members and the combined force of Missy and Chaffarn.  "We'll hold them back while the treasure is removed" yelled Nigel as he positioned himself and Pongo to block the advance of the other two warbands.  The tale of the Battle of Thermopylae popped into his head.

Bemis finally successfully cast Grenade but did minimal damage.  Agarn attempted another Fog but rushed his casting and failed.  The failure allowed Missy's crossbowman to hit Nigel with a well placed shot that all but knocked him to his knees (11 points of damage).  The storm had little effect this time.

Shadow is beset upon by Chaffarn's hell hound and a treasure hunter.  Leaping and snapping, he initially fights both of them off.  Soon tiring, Shadow is eventually taken out by the treasure hunter.  Nigel also finds himself facing two opponents - Chaffarn's thug and a red-eyed, psychotic looking treasure hunter (Possessed).  Like Shadow, Nigel is successful with the first few rounds of combat, blocking or parrying all attacks.



Nigel takes on all challengers

Bemis, seeing the closely packed group of henchmen, successfully tosses a Grenade into their midst.  He must be picking up the wrong items to use as surrogate grenades as once again he failed to cause much damage.  The henchman herd continued to advance on his warband - eager to steal his treasure.  Agarn suddenly remembers the treasure hidden by the tombstone.  He quickly picks it up and heads for safety.

Severely weakened by the crossbow bolt, its only a matter of time before Nigel falls in combat with the possessed treasure hunter.  As Nigel falls, he smiles knowing that they had held out long enough as he sees the rest of his warband disappearing into the ruins, burdened by five treasure chests.  Pongo finds himself engaged with Missy's treasure hunter.  It proved to be a short fight ending with him face down in the snow. 

Facing the Onslaught

Bemis, holding his robes high to keep from tripping, quickly follows his warband.  Back at the old library, Bemis awaits word of the four that had been left behind.  And while he is waiting, he increases his knowledge by perusing some of the written works in the old library (Successfully cast Absorb Knowledge). 

After a couple hours, Nigel stumbles in half-carrying 9Toe.  "No one else will be following us, they didn't make it" said Nigel.  "That's a tough break, I liked Pongo" he added.

While Nigel and 9Toe go off to get some rest, Bemis lays out what they recovered.  Agarn counted 370 gold coins; plus there were three potions, two scrolls, a magic ring (Teleport), and what looked to be another set of magic amulets (Eyes of Amoto).  All told, not a bad day's work.  37 gold coins were set aside for Nigel.  Bemis decided to keep the second set of amulets even though he wasn't sure they would be useful.  He could always sell them later.

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What a great game!  Bemis was worried when both of the warbands to his right decided to call a temporary truce jointly attack his warband.  All told, there were eleven henchmen engaged with his men or heading his way.  Nigel, Pongo, and Shadow sold themselves well and delayed Chaffarn and Missy just long enough.  Of course, the game couldn't have ended at a better time.

Nigel ended the game with 90 xp.  He would have hit 100 if he hadn't been taken out.    I want to see how effective he becomes after a couple of levels under his belt.

I thought I had taken more pictures but I guess I was caught up in the excitement.  I'll try and do better next time.