D&D Journal: Damn things won’t die already! [28.12.07]

General Notes:
We didn’t play last week ’cause I couldn’t make it.
Alex joined the group with the Cleric/Auspician of Tymora Felix.
Koby switched characters (from Seamore the dwarf cleric to Tristan, the half-orc barbarian/fighter/frenzied berserker).
Efim switched characters last session to Diadora the druid.
A lot of great role-playing, especially character and NPC interaction. Also a lot of original use of spells. A great session!
A 7 1/2 hour long session – whew! And we didn’t even plan for a marathon…

The Journal:
Session Date: 28.12.07
Present Players: Mickey (Verena), Koby (Seamore), Effim (Diadora), Alex (Felix)
Game Date: 385 TME (to The Modern Era) Spring
Day 28 in the Maze.
Time: ~10:00
Start Point: In the corridor on the way to the room with the screaming skull, after Verena fainted in her bubble.
Sleep Time: ~23:00
NPCs Met:

• Thaeryn - an arcane caster and a man of god, you (understandably) mistook this green robed human to be a druid (what with all the nature theme). Thaeryn seems to believe that he’s cursed for using to many spells, especially teleportation spells, in the maze. Diadora, who was the first to meet him, quickly lost interest in helping him, and shoved him unceremoniously into Verena’s hands. Is it possible that Verena’s power of the arcane aren’t what’s needed now? Considering that she couldn’t help Thaeryn (even though he offered spells in exchange for help), and that he himself couldn’t help himself, perhaps another sort of caster is needed for the job. You left Thaeryn patiently waiting in the tavern.
• In the tavern you saw (but did not speak to), Gloviel (female human), Vitpek (male half-elf who was weeping) and Belyunduil (male elf). The three do not appear to be related, but do appear to belong to a group. Arios mentioned that you can trust them, in her letters.
• You also met your friends from last time: Thaemond, Bromaryn and Aaredan.

Rooms Explored: The inn, the dragon room (with a vampiric red dragon in it, this time), and some characters had detours of their own. On your way to another room in the maze you ran straight into two large humanoids, wielding greatswords and composite longbows. They had metallic dark blue skin, blazing yellow eyes, white tribal scar marks on their cheeks, and an hawk carved onto their breastplates and dyed with blood. Although non of you could recognize the species, by the way they got up after you had apparently killed them, you tend to think they might be related to trolls. However, fire seems to have little effect on them, so that theory remains to be proved. Also, they failed to display any of the mindless stupidity usually associated with trolls, actually using tactics to get behind the lines and attack weaker opponents, as well as focusing their attacks on Tristan, the main damage dealer.
Enemies Fought: the friendly humanoids from above.
Things Found: Arios’s letters, and a bit of background about Arios. I’ll not expand on the letters, as they are private.
One liners/Character interaction: “I’m itching everywhere”, Verena after gaining consciousness; “I drank milk!” Verena happy after drinking spiked milk; “That’s my inn! Now I’ll have to redecorate!”, Tristan is unhappy after Verena tries to turn off the lights and blasts her room wall; “He looks like a parrot”, Diadora dryly identifies Felix’s species; “This should be simple – I’ll go in, ask the dragon for his blood, and then go out”, Diadora makes battle plans to handle a dragon; “I haven’t much luck today, have I?”, Felix and Alex have little success with god consulting/coin flipping.
End Point: In one of the corridors of the maze, after killing (?) the electric blue humanoids.

D&D Journal #27

The following journal is short, because I’m unusually busy right now. I just took my session notes, and edited them, to make them more readable. I’d be really happy to know what you think about this format, as opposed to the previous journals.

Campaign: Ancient Runes
Session Date: 19.5.06
Present Players: Mickey (Verena), Koby (Seamore), Effim (Hrothgar), Alexey (Ringold), Natalie (Grenada), Gideon (Ivillious)
Game Date: 285 TME (to The Modern Era) Early Spring
Day 5 in the Maze.
Time: ~24:00
Sleep Time: ~13:00 [sleep time is the next time you are supposed to sleep, if you sleep at the same time each day]
NPCs Met:
Seebo, male gnome leader
Gerbo, male gnome
Duldshvan, male gnome
Fonkin, male gnome
Ondami, tall black Human in crimson and purple robes, with a ruby on his forehead and a carved bone amulet.
Arios the Paladin
Rooms Explored: slamming doors corridor(no description, as you’ve passed it), ex-fire elemental room (Ringold and Ivillious weren’t there, and the room was squeaky clean. Eerily clean. You set out on a quest to find your dead friends’ bodies), gnome room (no description, as you’ve passed it), merchant corridor (he wasn’t there), Paladin room (see one liners/character interaction), Cleric room (Ondami was there, and he gave you your first mission [out of three], in order to retrieve your friends, who are currently “traveling between worlds and planes”, as he phrased it) and then the ooze room.
Enemies Fought:
[maze group] Oozes – 4 black ones and 2 clear ones. Awful battle. This is the last time I’m bringing in Oozes that split.
[mountain group] 2 large, white, ape-like creature and one huge, white, ape-like creature. Nice tactics there.
Things Found: Not much worth noting.
One liners/Character interaction: Hrothgar was unusually impatient. Hopefully his ego will go down a notch or two. You also discovered that he came to the maze in order to find a cure for his bear changing phenomenon.
Seamore had some nice interaction with Arios, the paladin, disappearing whenever he saw her.
Arios had a nice discussion with Verena and Hrothgar. She also told you that you might have visions at the beginning of the next part of the labyrinth.
Grenada found her voice a bit, this session. Needs to take the lead a bit more – but a definite improvement.
Ivillious and Ringold had some fun in the sun in a freezing mountain (died there, too)-range and in mysterious metal building.
End Point: ~5:30 in the morning. Outside the room with the oozes. Hrothgar is pretty bashed up.

D&D Journal #23

Long time no play…
Most of the last session was devoted to going over corridors (you walked quite a few miles there. By night-time you’ll all be dead tired, with aching legs and sore backs), as you started checking out those places, in the first part of the maze, that you haven’t seen yet.
Ivillious had a nice, long roam in a forest – yes a forest – grown inside the labyrinth’s walls. He met with a few critters (and almost got strangled to death by a plant), before meeting with a Centaur, one of the three protectors of the forest, who told him a little about the place. Meanwhile, Ringold took a rest on a tree (?), and Seamore and Verena tried (unsuccessfully) to convince him that now is a good time to leave. Damn that girl is impatient!
When Ivillious returned to you, happy as can be, you walked into a room filled with sarcophagi, cold, dark with flickering candled and eerie shadows – that attacked you! Due to Seamore‘s insistence that you go inside and investigate, Seamore and Ringold walked in, and were attacked. Ivillious tried to help, but his arrows seemed to have not effect on the shadows, whilst Seamore turned undead, Ringold fought for his life, Verena protected you all, and the Shadows drained as much strength as they could from you. Seamore and Ringold survived the battle (Seamore only just), weakened and wiser (we hope).
Verena was furious at Seamore for his “irresponsible behavior”, and demanded to know what the hell he was thinking, going in there, and why the hell did he have to drag Ringold with him (quite a lot of cursing for a girl her age). Seamore tried to avoid the confrontation, but in the end he promised that he’d give the group a good enough reason for his behavior. We wait with held breath to hear what the dwarf has to say for himself…
The next room you opened was an exact duplicate of this one, and you hastily closed the door and left the place, going to a completely different zone of the labyrinth.
The next room you walked into had a “Shishka-Rogue” in the middle of it and a nice trophy at the end, not to mention all the junk in the world in the middle. You decided to leave that room for later on, when your rogue’s up to it.
Finally, you walked into a different zone altogether, and there you saw a trail of fresh blood on the floor. Following the trail, you finally meet with a good looking paladin girl, bleeding to death on the floor (she passed out a few seconds after she wrote “Help Me” in her own blood). You heal her (and Ringold steals her sword), and she awakens, and tells you her story, after walking with you to her ‘quarters’ (a pitifully small and straw furnished room). Her name is Arios, she’s a paladin to Ilumater, and she helps you quite a bit – telling you where to find a merchant, where many of the first section’s hidden doors are, what to beware of, what to look for. Verena asks her to join you, but she gently refuses, claiming that people just want her to join their group as a healer, out of their own interests, and she believes that she can do more good here (healing others, clearing the maze from wandering monsters). She fully believes that she’s going to end her life in the maze, and has come to accept that as punishment for following her lover into the maze, instead of convincing him to remain outside with her. She watched her lover die in the hands of “the terrible judges”, and watched her group crumble in their hands, as well. The judges let her live (“it was all fun for them”), and she eventually managed to make her way back to the first area of the maze (“it’s much safer here. Less wandering monsters, less judges, less greedy merchants”). Verena is touched by her story, and promises to come back for her, when you find your way out, and supplies her with some food, which is very hard to find just lying around. Arios didn’t want to go into the details, but she had to bear and do some unpleasant things just so she won’t starve to death in the maze.
You leave, with Arios blessing you profusely, and go to the room at the top of the corridor you’re in.
Surprisingly, it contains a little girl, skipping and singing, in a large and empty room (dark blue ceiling sand colored floor and walls). Verena tries to simply walk into the room, and suffers a nasty shock, leaving you all to muss about the problem. Finally, Verena tries to skip and chant after the girl, exactly as she does, and so manages to make it to the other side of the room, in one piece. Following her example, the rest of you made your way to the door on the other side, and were about to open it when…
The session ended.