My sister joined us today and played D&D for the first time since… well, the 90s I guess. Guillaume was quick to point out that the group badly needed a « tank ». That was promptly ignored as my sister chose to play another wizard, with poor constitution to boot. So the group pretty much flirt with death in every combat still, but that’s not without fun!

This time around the PCs chose to do two side quests that they could do simultaneously: kill batiri goblins for Camp Vengeance and go retrieve a lost Shield Guardian for Wakanga.

Characters:

• Lucky, Half-Elf Cleric of Tymora (Trickery), Street Urchin; the lowly will be exalted
• Shin, Tabaxi Fighter (Arcane Archer), Outlander; big-game hunter, has no patience for weakness
• Corpos, High Elf Wizard (Necromancer), Archeologist; antiquary, strange fixation on the undead
• Kalohan, High Elf Wizard (Evoker), Inheritor; noble Elf, ill-suited for adventuring life

Payment promised:

• 10 gp per batiri killed
• 20 gp for even more dangerous kuro clan (they have specific ritual scars)
• 50 gp for those goblin leaders: Bat Queen, Green Strangler, Mantis Warrior
• 2000 gp for the recovery of the Shield Guardian and its amulet (can be paid in spells, for more value)

Departure

The PCs bought a canoe and supplies before leaving Port Nyanzaru to journey on the Soshenstar river. The first few days were uneventful as they passed by plantations and fishermen. They made a quick  stop at a floating market and then later, they stayed a night at the Tanner’s Lodge, a place that offered a safe roof if you can tolerate the awful stench that goes hand in hand with leather working. Corpos bought himself a scuta leather armor.

Epic it was Not (1)

The landscape definitely less and less human-touched, the PCs got a first (modest) taste of action. A dead tree lying on the riverbank served as a nest for bloodsucking Stirges. Half a dozen were coming at them as the PCs flung mundane and magical projectiles, killing 4 in no time. A nearby Giant Dragonfly snatched the remaining two midair.

Size does matter

Next day, while they portage, the PCs were surrounded by enthusiastic diminutive velociraptors, chirping (or whatever a velociraptor does to communicate) at each other. Kalohan’s quick thinking prevented an attack, a minor illusion spell put on their canoe let it look like a Stegosaurus instead, further enhancing the fierceness of the group.

A few  hours later they come upon a broken canoe. Kalohan yet again proved her usefulness as she cast a mending spell et voilà, they now had two canoes! This would have funny implications later on as the two elven wizards got themselves on the same boat despite being total wimps…

Later, on the river once more, the PCs warily eyed a big specimen of Spinosaurus who was fortunately busy eating a big prey. The fearsome beast ignored them and they were glad for it.

Reality Check

Fourth night and now in true primeval environment, the PCs had to choose on which riverbank they would spend the night. In typical player fashion, they chose neither: « lets tie our boats so that we stay on the middle of river and sleep onboard » they came up with…

Corpos, his turn to stay awake, was oblivious to the menace and didn’t see anything until he was shot on the chest by an arrow. A second poisoned arrow sent him sprawling on the bottom of the canoe, convulsing and frothing from the mouth. At least, this did awaken his companions.

Shin badly wounded one of the assailants (batiri goblins) with a bow shot of his own, but soon 3 arrows converged on him from the jungle’s foliage, taking him down too (one critical hit).

Things started to look grim…

Fortunately, the cleric managed to stay alive and worked very hard so that his companions would too.

A fire bolt from Kalohan on the already wounded batiri sent him fleeing and Corpos  greedily finished him with a magic missile.

Two consecutive sleep spells from the evoker turned the tide of the battle in favor of the adventurers.

The whole combat took 8 rounds… 8! Against 4 goblins… (2) The shoot & hide tactics of the batiri proved to be absolutely deadly.

Helping Hand

Having survived another day (barely), the PCs saw an unusual scene as two vegepygmies standing on a dead trunk tried to help a third who had somehow fallen in the river. The PC were divided on the question of helping, particularly Shin who remembered well a bloody battle in a mine against some of these creatures. It was Corpos, necromancer do-gooder, that insisted on helping, and he proceeded to do it with a mage hand spell, which would help pull the poor vegepygmy out. It sufficed to get him out of his predicament. It was hard to tell if the rescued creature and its fellows were indeed happy with the help, but Corpos felt that he did what he had to do. (3)

This plant we shall utterly destroy

Kalohan and Lucky hastily jumped from their canoes and swam toward an irresistible scent coming from the riverbank but they shook off the lure before the deadly mantrap could eat them alive. The PCs then proceeded to bombard the slow-moving monstrous plant from afar, just to be sure.

They found a short sword and gold ring near the destroyed plant.

No no no. No!

A medium-sized lizard could be seen, or at least some parts of it, dangling from a tree branch inside a web coccoon. Kalohan, obviously not a big fan of anything spidery (4), shot the damn thing with a fire bolt.

Almost instantly attracting:

1 Giant (large) Spider, 3 Giant (medium) Spiders, 2 Insect (spider) Swarms

Shin efficiently killed the 3 medium-sized spiders with a well-placed explosive arrow. Meanwhile, the horrible Big Spider threw a web full of (normal-sized) spiders (5) directly on Shin and Lucky’s canoe.

Another swarm quickly followed on the other canoe and then Big Spider proceeded to get herself nearer which almost provoked an instant heart attack from poor Kalohan…

The swarms were surprisingly dangerous but fragile against magic. Arrows and fire bolts were enough to kill Big Spider in the end.

Why these two together again?

This could have been avoided. Should have been avoided! But lack of heart and feeble arms meant instead a deadly encounter (6).

11 crocodilians got up on their beach and swam toward the PCs. Shin and Lucky easily distanced the beasts. Corpos looked like he didn’t know which end of the paddle was the handle. Kalohan was… even worst! She dropped her paddle in the river! (6)

And so combat ensued. Kalohan, at one point, unconscious, got dragged into the water to be croco snack. She got saved in extremis by her companions (7).

End of session

DM’s notes:

1. Just to familiarize my sister with combat rules
2. Albeit they weren’t standard goblins, those batiri are tough mofos, having 18hp as in Jungles of Chult. Plus, they were using Fire Ant poison
3. And got an inspiration point
4. Here I am, making fun of my sister’s phobia, yet again!
5. I kinda pimped the spider « boss » a little
6. bad timing for a 1!
7. with 2 failed death saves and 2 succeeded before the cleric could finally stabilize her