June Dungeon Delve Review

Warning: May contain spoilers

Well this weekend at my local gaming store (Alternate Icons) we ran what is to be the last Dungeon Delve from WotC that i can get my hands on. Sanity's Precipice is a delve for five level 25 characters and wow it was good. The story line was pretty solid and the players had all enjoyed playing it.

Good: Neat mix of monsters, the encounters were pretty fun. Level 25 was fun for experienced players
Bad: Four combat encounters is a bit much, i understand that delves are designed to be run one encounter a week type deal but even that doesn't seem solid. Level 25 was not a good start for new players.
Ugly: Having previously only run Game Day's with poster maps, i did not like having to build each encounter, i lost time with that.

Setup: The setup was fun and there was lots of information that was provided, however it seemed to only add more questions for players that wanted to cause trouble, and no key reward for those players who ask whats in it for them.

Encounter 1
This encounter was fun, however the Efreet's seemed week vs a 25th level party

Encounter 2
This encounter was the most fun and enjoyable for our group. They liked the fact that the one creature could attack 8 times a round and took advantage of it. This fight was also the fastest.

Encounter 3
Thought encounter 3 is key to the story and for encounter 4, i skipped this. The main reason being we had a player out who last played d&d when it was ad&d back in the 90's so things took a bit longer than normal. (understandably so)

Encounter 4
As a DM i loved the end boss, he was so much fun and actually killed the party warlord with one attack. (warlord decided to make multiple saves, failing 3 times, died and then came back to life due to the druids magic item)

Overall i had lots of fun running this, and its sad to see it go because every time i ran a new game in town, we got new players into 4e

Dungeon Delve you will be missed.

Until next time keep your dice on the table.

SoO Game Night 11.1

Out of Game

The game started off splitting up the core dragon treasure hoard and ensuring they were up to speed on paragon level. We discussed some new powers and feets, some new books and the fact i bought a DM screen. Tonight was pretty solid, i kind of sand boxed it a bit, a fair amount of role playing in the begging.

In Game

The group returned to Pax's home as heroes, Pax left for a day only to return with wings (scion of acosia) the group decided they needed to try and track down Alexandar, former Earl of Northwitch, former leader of the Templar knights, holder of a great weapon against evil. Problem is no one knows where to look for him.

Teleporting to Wyrmclaw, the wizards home town the wizard decided to send a letter off to the King of Ebn, King Greycastle. The letter informed the king of the party's intentions. Belrack decided to do some research on elves, he felt it quite strange no elves are ever noticed or seen. Svelt on the other hand simply went to a tavern where she was recognized as one of the Waylanders. The tavern was soon packed out into the streets with people wanting to buy the dwarf a beer and listen to her tall tales of adventure. Pax decided to patrol the streets. After a short time he was stopped by a hooded man asking about the weather and calling him by name. Pax climbed a building to get a better view of the weather and noticed a strange cloud of darkness and smoke looming over Ashcaster about one day horse ride away. The man appeared to have a metal arm, and told Pax to assemble the rest of his party. While the wizard finished up with the letter to the king, he was leaving the guard post and saw a old man stumble in the streets about to be overrun by a carriage. The wizard sent his familiar to scare the horses while he quickly went to help the old man. The old man thanked him by name and was glad he had heart, the old man was the wizards former master. Their teachings shrouded in mystery this was the first time they actually met. The old man told the wizard to gather his friends as trouble is brewing in Ashcaster.

The Wizards old mentor teleported the part directly to ashcaster, in the middle of the fire.

Encounter 1: The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire.

The party cough the troublemakers off guard and begin their attacks. The group focused primarily on the Bloodfire Harpy and the Fire Achon Emberguard while buildings were still burning with people inside. After their enemies were able to get their bearings, two Legion Devil Hellguards attacked Belrack, and two attacked Pax, while a Flameshard focused its attacks on Svelt. A Neldrazu tried to also grab Belrack and teleport away but failed to do so. The Harpy did not stand a chance and was the first to die fallowed by the Hellguards. After the Flameshared was destroyed the party focused on getting people out of the burning houses. While Pax and the wizard dispatched of the Emberguard, the Neldrazu saw how the fight was going and left quickly as possible.

With a quarter of the villagers left they recounted the tale of how a boy saw nine cloaked figures raise a dark portal outside of the town, and how a human in black plate mail came into the center of the town and grew in size. At that point the creatures started burning everything in sight.

The wizard performed a mending ritual on the local church so the villagers would have some shelter while they rebuild the town.

The group decided to investigate the portal.

Encounter 2: Dark Portal

The portal was well guarded by Foulspawns, the Seer ever ready for battle. However the insane creatures did not stand a chance against the party, specifically the wizards force cage. The Mangler and Seer were quickly dispatched but not before causing damage of their own, the Berserker was also cut down by Svelts blade, but not before causing the attack to also arc onto Belrack. One Grue was launched into the portal from the attack and did not come back out.

Now the party stands in front of the portal deciding what to do and how they can close the portal.

Treasure & XP

Encounter 1: 2,402 / 4 = 600 each
Encounter 2: 2,050 / 4 = 512 each
Total per player: 1,112 xp

NPC's

Kristophe Il'Quinn
- mentor to party wizard
Regan Markus
- Thought was previously dead
- Now has metallic arm

Quotes of the Day

-none-

SoO Game Night 10.5

Out of Game

Everyone was excited for last nights game, we were getting ready to fight the dragon. We had all six players show up tonight which was good. Short night because it was all focused on the dragon fight.

In Game

Encounter 8: The Dragon

The fight was against a level 11 solo dragon, three Dragonborn gladiators, three Dragonborn elemental. The dragon went first, and popped up right in front of the players and breathed acid then dove back under water. The pc's began exploring the cave only to then find the Dragonborn fighters moving in. The battle was lengthy and ate away at the players uses of magic items, action points and healing surges.

The group tired and desperate was victorious, and worked with the local Dragonborn tribe to fashion items out of the dragon scales.

DM Note: In my realm there are 8 different main dragons, each with their own tribe, and they all live peacefully to a degree. Dragonborns take on the color of their tribe. Having another dragon in the area poses a great threat to all, it would mean the death of one tribe.

Treasure & XP

Lots, the group leveled up to paragon level and received a fair amount of treasure. i included a lot of low level magic items, since the party can only get 1/5th of the value anyway it still feels like a good reward to them.


NPC's

No new NPCs found

Quotes of the Day

[referring to dragon darkness & overlapping warlock damage darkness]
DM: How do you know to step there, how come you wouldn't step in the other square
Player6: because i meta gamed alright, i meta gamed
DM: fair enough

Will start chapter 11 next week

Until then, keep your dice on the table.