Still Hiatus-y

Hello folks!

So, the Sunday group didn't meet this week.

But might meet this week.

Or maybe the week after.

It seems like I've lost a player...

I'm still on hiatus from creating new homebrew.

But I have been working on the 4e-to-5e races and a few of the class options.

I had some serious "shower epiphanies" about one of my board games for my company.

So that was cool.

Going to revise and implement those decisions when I get time.

I am packing and cleaning my apartment.

And my house purchase has been pushed back one week.

I officially filed my first assessment of someone in my new job.

And I feel great about that :)

So, until next we meet, may the dice fall in your favor.

Praerus D&D 5e Campaign Notes, Session 11

Greetings, internet-people!

I have a small announcement before I begin writing up the campaign update you came for:
At the top of the page, you may notice a link to a page called "All-Brew."
This page has direct links to everything that I'm working on (and some stuff that I just like).
That way, you don't have to dig through back log to find a homebrew that you were interested in :)

Now, back to business!
This week, we had Rellon, Agent M, and Trinity in the party. Everyone else was sick or otherwise occupied.
For those of you paying attention, that means that the paladin and cleric were both relegated to "healbot" for this week :)

----------------------------

When we left off, the party had just reached the second floor of the cave complex.
The labyrinth.

When looking over their options, the party decided to travel to Arroh's shrine first.
There, they went through one of the western doorways.

The chamber beyond was largely devoid of features.
An odd glyph was carved into the doors on the northern, western, and southern walls.
Rellon looked them over and recognized them as an older dialect of primordial.
They said "You shall not pass." (shut up)

The party spent a few minutes dividing themselves up among the doors so that they could investigate:
Trinity and Rellon investigated the western door;
the dretches investigated the southern door;
and M stayed as far back as possible.

Trinity and Rellon spent some time with their door, searching for any hidden catches or other triggers.
The dretches were hammering away at the surfaces.

Then, Trinity decided to touch the rune (despite warnings).
And it lit up briefly and emitted a sound like crystal ringing.

Everyone thought this interesting.
Then, with some excellent planning, the party stepped back and assigned three of the dretches to trace the runes at the same time.
They did so gleefully.
The runes glowed and the crystal-sound grew louder and louder.
Just before it couldn't get any louder, it stopped and the doors rolled into the ceiling!

Trinity decided to try to walk through the northern door to check for danger.
She found herself walking back into the room from the western door.

Of course, this was puzzling for everyone.
With some exploration, they found that all three of the doors looped back on the main chamber without much rhyme or reason.
To make matters more confusing, anyone that looked beyond the doorway saw that the room beyond wasn't the one they were standing in.
After some further experimentation (throwing rocks, throwing a severed dretch head from the last session, etc.), the party decided that they didn't want to mess around with this puzzle any longer.

Then, in an out-of-character discussion that turned funny, someone mentioned the possibility of the Tarrasque being in the tunnels.
And Trinity's player is completely new and had no idea why that could be so bad.
So, after some explanation that a wish is required to kill the thing for good, Trinity's player spouted this bit of awesome: "It's the opposite of Tinkerbell."

After that bit of silliness, the party resumed their journey through labyrinth, seeking out the prophecy.

On their way there, they encountered a very long room that was filled with ashes.
Everyone figured that the room would be trapped, but a dretch volunteered to confirm it.
By running across the room.
Fire started shooting out from the walls, trying to incinerate the odd demon.
Somehow, it managed to cross the room and return to the party before collapsing (unconscious, not dead).

Agent M looked over the floor to see what kind of pressure plates might be there.
Once those were identified, Rellon used a mage hand cantrip to push the tiles to see where was safe.
Using this method, he crossed the room with Trinity.
They were curious to see if a door might be hidden on the opposite wall.
With a quick search, they found one and Ulic unlocked it (while on autopilot).

Opening the door, they found a large round chamber with a ladder in the middle and three other exits that had the same rune as the odd chamber earlier.

While the rest of the party decided how to proceed, Trinity decided to run around and be Trinity.
First, she climbed up the ladder and opened the trap door to reveal that it exited onto a grassy plain.
Then, she slid down the ladder and didn't set her brakes fast enough.
To the north, she found a room filled with cages and animal bones. There were three additional exits from here, but she decided to go back to the main group.

Next, the party decided to travel southwards.
They came to a fork and decided to take the right branch.
Then Trinity was nearly taken out by an arrow.
The room had a large "fortress" made of chairs and tables set up on the opposite side.
A quick look told Rellon that it was lizardfolk make.
Putting two and two together, they realized that some lizardfolk were behind the barricade.

Diplomacy was had (by Trinity even!) and the lizardfolk eventually entered the room.
Four warriors that had no idea how they had gotten into the labyrinth.

And then Rellon had to make a minor magical display to keep the dretches in line.
And lizardfolk revere magic and its practitioners.
To show follower score here: Rellon 9, Trinity 0

With their new allies, the party continued southward.
And found a room filled with hieroglyphics and other images.
With a quick history roll, the party realized that this was how the Old Ones recorded their prophecies.
VICTORY!

Rellon used comprehend languages, but the prophecy was encrypted (because why not?).
While the party recorded the images on the walls, the lizardfolk cried out "THEY'RE HERE!" and started firing arrows down the hallway.
Trinity decided that she would try to win them over with a display of bravery and charged in, hammer and shield raised.
M peeked around the corner and saw absolutely nothing.
Apparently, the lizardfolk had been in the tunnels long enough to lose their minds.
The dretches, however, were already slightly mad and took this opportunity for potential bloodshed to charge down the hall.
And no one stopped them.
And they kept charging...
Rellon 4, Trinity 0

One of the lizardfolk acted like he was shot - "THEY GOT ME!"
He laid down and was acting like he would die. M scooped him up and called for medical attention.
Which Trinity provided (she is trained in medicine, after all...)

Rellon tried using sleep to pacify Trinity and the lizardfolk, but they refused to go down. One lizardfolk did yawn, however.
His next plan was to utilize Sabah to cast lesser restoration and fix the lizardfolk.
Which worked beautifully. They all came out of their madness!

With the prophecy secured and the lizardfolk calmed, the party returned to the surface using the ladder they had found earlier.
As they neared the forest outside of Rosewood, they started to fall asleep - one by one.
Except Trinity.
When she turned around to find her companions passed out, there was a shadowy figure snatching the prophecy and making a run for it!

Trinity decided to pursue the interloper.
Despite her party being unconscious and without guards.

She chased the thing through the forest, throwing her spear after it, jumping over obstacles...
And then she tripped!
Just as the shadow was about to get away, she hurled her flask of acid at it.
It made contact, and the shadow vanished.
She searched for the scroll case that the prophecy was in, but it was nowhere to be seen.
Disheartened, she returned to the party.

Just about then, M came around and found a wolf nudging him.
He laid there and tried to not be intimidating.
Suddenly, something came crashing through the trees and scared the wolves off.
Seeing this as a truly bad situation, he jumped up and drew his twin daggers, ready to slay whatever it was or run, as needed (pure rogue stuff here).

Then, Trinity came out of the woods.
M relaxed and the two set about waking the party up.
With a quick search, they found that the prophecy was missing.
The party thought about who or what the shadow may have been. As it could put others to sleep and apparently teleport, it was clear they were dealing with a spellcaster of sorts. Rellon suggested that someone from the Arcanum, who knew about his mission, might have done this. But, that just left more questions than answers.

After some discussion, the party decided that Rellon would set up several alarms near the prophecy chamber to alert them if anyone decided to visit it.
Then, they started back toward town.

----------------------

And that's what happened!
Even though Trinity was present, we got some good plot progress taken care of :) (nothing but love, if you read this Benny)

But who was that shadowy character and what did they want with the prophecy?
Will Trinity be able to get the lizardfolk into town and get them drunk?
What will the party do now that they have lost their hard-won prophecy?

Answers to these and more when next we game!
...
Which might not be for a couple of weeks, as I am moving and still haven't done much packing.
But we shall see!

Until then, dear readers.
Until then.

Quick Post and A Thing!

What? Two updates in one week?
Surely this is the golden age returning!

Sadly, no.
I'm just dropping in to deliver the rough draft of the

4e-to-5e Race Conversion Guide

which I had said would be up this week :)

I'm thinking that I might take a brief hiatus this coming week to pack my house and maybe work on some of my other projects (such as the first novel in a series of four that I'm writing [part 2 is already finished]).
I am not abandoning the blog or my homebrewing stuff.
But next week will probably just include an update on the adventuring group's shenanigans.
Assuming that we meet :)

Anyway, that's all I had for today.
I'll try to work on that guide and the other homebrew stuff on-and-off for the next few days, but don't expect miracles from me.
When I return to homebrew stuff, maybe I'll write up some 4e class conversions that need doing...

Until next time, readerfolk :)

Praerus D&D 5e Campaign Notes, Session 10

Morning, everyone!

Sorry that my 4e-to-5e conversion project is taking so long. Between work and moving into my first real house, things have been hectic. Like I keep saying. However, I should have the roughest of drafts done up for the races sometime by the end of the week.
If all goes well.

Now, onto other things: the Sunday group met up for gaming. This week, Ulic was back in but Trinity was out. Also, the session was kind of short due to other obligations. Even so, we managed quite a bit of ground covering :)

----------------

When last we saw our adventuring companions, they had just re-entered the dark caves below Rosewood.

And, not long afterwards, Ulic awoke on the pew.
After gaining his bearings, he went off to catch up to the group. He took the quicker way into the caves and ended up bumping into the party completely by incident.

Reunited, the party decided to finish "mapping" the first floor of the dungeon complex.

The first chamber they entered was filled with more of the violet fungi and shriekers that they had encountered earlier.
Hek, deciding that some mushrooms would be a great addition to his next dish, started flinging eldritch blasts about. And, given that mushrooms can't move, it was quite literally like shooting fish in a barrel.
When he was done, he entered the chamber to collect the spoils. Surprisingly, he also found 3 pieces of platinum.
M, using his keen rogue eyes, noticed a pouch of something near his feet. Picking it up, he discovered a full bag of dust of dryness. More on that later.

Satisfied with their haul, the party wandered the tunnels once more. This time, they discovered a room that was literally filled with rats. Swarms of them.
The party, having moved ever so sneak-ily into the tunnel outside the room, struck up a pretty solid plan to avoid trouble.
Hek, having the initiative, charged into the room and cast arms of hadar. Twice (using action surge).
Then, Sabah tossed in a fireball.
Between the two of them, they wiped out 18 rat swarms in the surprise round.
Which is pretty magical (pun aside).
But not as magical as Hek's player's next line - "Diplomacy - success!"
And then when we discussed marching order after that - "Hek in front, party in back."

After some hearty chuckles, the party resumed travel.
This time, they wanted to explore the tunnels near the chamber they found all the zombies in.
Down one side of it, they found a path that ended in what appeared to be a waterfall.
Smart adventurer sorts that they are, they decided to test it.
First, they threw a pebble with light cast on it through the waterfall. And it fizzled out. Antimagic?
Then, M stuck the end of "his" spear through it. And the end got melted off. Acid!

And it was then that I regretted some of my earlier DM-ing decisions.
M took five pinches of his dust of dryness and cast them into the waterfall.
He now has five pellets of compressed liquid ouchy.

Seeing no path beyond the waterfall (and deftly dodging a pretty sweet trap, might I add), the party left the vicinity and soon found a broom closet and another tunnel leading off from the room before the zombie chamber.
With some quick thinking, the party realized that the tunnel should come out behind the door that scratched when they knocked. So, they looked for a hidden catch or other lever to open it with.
M, being the rogue-iest of rogues, spotted the trigger before anyone else.
With Hek in place as a meat-shield, they opened the door.

It rolled slowly to the side.
Hek, using his demonically-fueled sight, saw several green, hairless gorillas beyond the door.
Unfortunately for him, they saw him too.
He charged them, they charged him.
And nothing happened.

Rellon, using his expansive knowledge, tried to figure out what they were and was able to come up with a name and origin - dretch, demon.
With a quick look, he also established that there were about 12 of them in the room.
He shouted out "Can we talk?"

Ulic, finding his time to shine, charged one of the dretches and used his smite ability to cleanly sever the head of one from its shoulders. Very epic scene.

On his turn, Rellon dove into the room and flung a lightning bolt through several of the dretches. Despite their lightning resistance, he rolled well enough to atomize all of them.

At this point, we let Trinity grab the severed dretch head. Because, auto-pilot or not, that is pretty much exactly what everyone thought she would do.

This left five dretches standing.
Rellon, dusting his hands off, politely asked "So, ready to talk now?"

Interestingly enough, the dretches decided to listen.
Also interestingly, Rellon was the only party member capable of speaking abyssal.

With some quick smooth talking and promises of slaughter for good behavior (M said something about stringing them along), the five remaining dretches became the hapless minions of the party.
With these new (and possibly soon to be reformed?) demons, the party headed for the second floor, deep within the earth.

--------------------

And that's where we left off!
Not so much actually done in terms of finding the prophecy they were sent to find, but a genuinely bizarre and fun time was had.
But, what will become of these folks that traffic with demons?
And will they find the prophecy they have struggled to locate?

Until next time, may the dice fall in your favor :)

Praerus D&D 5e Campaign Notes, Session 9

Sorry for only posting once last week! Things got hectic and I couldn't make as much progress on the 4e-to-5e Race Guide as I had hoped. Should have something workable up later this week if all goes well (but with moving and such... we'll see...).

Now, the Sunday group met and things got kind of... Well, Trinity wasn't absent if that's any indicator ;)

This week, we had Rellon, Trinity, Hek, Sabah, and we introduced... Agent M, as I call him. Multiple names for different reasons. That sort of guy. Ulic was gone due to some mix-up in communication.

-------------------

When last we left off, the party had just gotten Ulic restored at the temple by a priest of Pholtus. However, the magic that cured him also promptly sent him into a deep, deep sleep.

Meanwhile, Agent M had received his next task in a cryptic letter. That's just the kind of man he is.
With those instructions, he slapped together his "wandering Priest of Heironeous" disguise and went to the temple, as instructed.

At this time, Rellon left to have a proper holy symbol of his new god (Trykus) forged to anchor Arroh's spirit to.
Hek, ever the helper, went downstairs to the galley to be "the cook." There, he made fast friends (sarcasm) with a reasonably-stable priest of Erythnul that was the acting chef for the day.
Trinity and Sabah, however, went into spiritualism mode and prayed with the old priest. Trinity would later, very forcefully, ask for help in finding out about the god-shard residing in her (she has a major problem with in-/out-character knowledge :/ ).

Agent M, seeing the act of aggression, figured that this was a signal for a shakedown that he was to be part of, so he locked the door. Very helpful of him.
It was also around this time that a scream issued from downstairs.

Across town, Rellon's holy symbol was being forged and he spent some time attuning with the strange sword he found in the elemental armory.
After some time, it whispered "hello?"
Ah, a truly mysterious thing.

When Rellon returned, he found the door barred and there was a brief conversation about why that might be. Many side-steps and circular phrases were used.

About that time, Hek's beef tongue was finished cooking and the meal bell was rung.
Everyone went and enjoyed the meal considerably. Unlike the dungeon cuisine that was served the day before.

Ulic laid on the pew like a lump.

After the meal was had, Trinity and Rellon went into full-on research mode and went to the archives to research this, that, and the other about their respective deities.
Hek recruited Agent M to clean up with him. And, given M's natural fear of orcs that wear severed hands as trophies, he was more than happy to help!
Sabah... smoked. Tobacco. Outside. She was rather boring.

In the archives, Rellon's background as a sage (and, after a die roll, professor at the Arcanum!) really shined through: he found some books on dead gods for Trinity to peruse and located a single passage that could help him track down more information about Trykus.

I don't remember the exact logistics of this decision, but M heard Rellon mention a prophecy, looted Ulic ("I always loot when I'm sad"), impersonated him, punched out a random adventurer outside, swapped their clothing, and went back into the church. Rather odd.

Back in the archives, Trinity was blaspheming (in Draconic) against every god of the world as she looked through her books and found nothing helpful.
Then, in a moment of pity, Rellon joined her search and, discovering what she wanted to do, he tried something rather intriguing: ink blots and free drawing.
Some dice and magic later, and Trinity actually got an idea as to which god was within her: Bast, a war god that died at the beginning of the Reckoning Wars.

The rest of the day was largely unremarkable, except Hek going hunting with a priestess of Ehlonna and stopping a deer's heart with eldritch blast.

During the hunting trip, Trinity attempted to deface the shrine of Beory and replace it with her own shrine.
Thankfully, a priest in the temple noticed this.
There were a few questions about how to remove him as an obstacle.
Finally, Rellon (or M? can't remember now) helped negotiate the establishment of a shrine to Trinity (going by the divine name of Hammurtym... I know).

That night is when we had to sit Trinity's player down and have "the talk" - more on that shortly.

Trinity decided she wanted to do all of the following that night:

• break into the temple
• attempt to deface the holy symbol of Beory on the shrine (made from pure malachite, btw)

So, there are clearly a few things wrong with what she wanted to do.

There was a looooong discussion that mostly involved the more experienced players saying "there are gods in this world that will smite you for something like that."

Thankfully, she saw some reason in that and amended her plan to:

• break into the temple
• shout "Beory sux, Trinity rulez!" (direct quote with misspellings)
• leap out a different window and beat a retreat to her house

Suffice to say, the town guard were at her door in the morning.

Blessedly (or not), M recognized the sergeant of the squad and was able to "negotiate" a "reduced" fine.

And just like that, my attempt at educating the warforged about consequences in the game world fell apart.

But M roleplayed the discussion so well that I literally couldn't argue with him.

After much silliness, the party decided to go after the prophecy again.

They took the sliding path in the field down instead of the goblin tunnels.

Down there at last, they decided to investigate the odd door that Rellon had found.

The one that scratched when he knocked on it.

With some trial and error and a quick conjuring, they were able to unlock the door and open it.

On the other side...

Stone.

The door was set in the wall, but there was nothing behind it.

Rellon used detect magic and saw an aura of conjuration on it.

Trinity searched for a hidden door, but found nothing.

There was some debate about using stronger divinations or dismantling the door, but they decided to close it and leave it be for now.

The whole time, I had my "DM strikes again" face on.

Next, the explored the tunnels again and came across a room that held several stone coffins.

M, keen-eyed rogue that he is, noticed the traps from a mile away and was able to stop anyone from entering the chamber.

10-foot pole in hand, they tapped the sarcophagi and sent darts flying from one wall to the next.

Then, Hek decided to test the mechanisms.

He took the pole and tapped one sarcophagus in a rapid burst.

Darts flew out.

Then, he gathered them, tested their strength, and divided some between his backpack and the holes in the wall to try to jam them.

Trinity was disappointed by the lack of poison on the darts.

And that is, more-or-less, where we ended for the day.

Will they find the prophecy next week? Or will they continue to derail themselves at an alarming pace?

Only time will tell!

Until next we chat, may the dice fall in your favor :)

New Job, New Things

Greetings internet people!

I have just started my second day of my new job as a job coach, and so far, so good. Seems like a lot to learn and get into the swing of, but nothing I can't handle.

Now, for the reason you folks read this blog: things related to gaming!

Even now, I'm finding forum posts from people that want to "up-vert" their character from 4e to 5e.
And, so, I have taken it upon myself to work out something for those wanting to do that (even if I'm late to the party lol)

So, later this week, I'm going to start converting 4e races to 5e compatible equivalents.
Due to copyright and what-have-you, I will not be using the same name that WotC used for their race, but I will include the 4e race name as a header to ease conversions.

So, be expecting that in the near-ish future.
Also, I will hopefully be working on/finishing my other homebrew items that need work.

Later on, I will start making assorted conversions to achieve properly converted classes, but I felt that the races would be easier.

So, until next time, may the dice fall in your favor :)