Virtual Greyhawk Con 4 report

 

This past weekend was Virtual Greyhawk Con 4 and I had the chance to play in a couple of games and also attend the "Ask the Experts" roundtable that closed the event.

On Saturday I played on Mike "Von Molkew" Mossberger's game "Mystery in Midmeadow", where we were a party of high level characters (mine was Hurrick, a dwarf bounty hunter) at the service of King Lynwerd of Nyrond. Mysterious attacks on Pholtan guerrillas prompted the summon of our group to investigate the area of Crystal Springs. The hints dropped by the DM, both in the thorough pre-game information and during the game, pointed (the players, not the characters) to the mythical drow! 

We had a skirmish with the dark eleves, managed to take one down and were taking out his corpse as proof, when more came and drove us deeper into the caves. We hit a dead end and thought that was it, when we were rescued by strange beings known as rockseer elves, antagonistic to the drow.

They asked about us and the surface world, and asked our help to prevent the drow completing a ritual of opening a portal that could give access the the Plane of Fey/Fading Lands. After handwaving a couple of encounters (a cavern filled with plant and fungi, and another cavern with a dragon skeleton/spectral dragon) we reached the cavern where the ritual was taking place. There, along with the portal, the drow and their half-drow half-spider guards, was a waterfall running upwards! It was the magical origin of the Franz River. After defeating the drow the rockseer elves sealed the place, gave us a letter to take to King Lynwerd and a magical ruby.

The caves under Cristal Springs

It's a dead end!

Mike has a deep knowledge on the setting and rules, that he complemented with some beautiful maps on Owlbear Rodeo. I forgot to take some captures but you can see them here.

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Later that day I played on Allan "grodog" Grohe's home game (runs every other Saturday) in which the party is currently at Dyvers, the City of Sails, where the group entrepreneurs are trying to sell the local temple of Nerull a pair of gems taken from a secluded and abandoned(?) temple of Nerull beneath Castle Greyhawk.  So far, so good...

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The next day, on Sunday, I played on Allan's game "Halls of the Iron Golems". A strange magical helix has appeared over the Free City of Greyhawk, causing magic to act in chaotic and unpredictable ways. A group of high level adventurers (mine was Barilar Willowbeard, a half-elf druid) was gathered to solve the problem. They needed to delve into the 12th level of Castle Greyhawk, find Heward's Mystical Organ and play a certain tune. 

On our way we encountered a glassteel skeleton golem, that resonated when struck by melee weapons damaging the attackers, and a giant slug. After some twists and turns, but always proceeding in a north-northwest direction, a trapped stair threw the party into a slide that split us into two chambers: one filled with water and one with a yellow poisonous gas, both chambers with skeletons at the bottom that tried to keep us down. Quick thinking, the use of magic items, and even a roll on the potion miscibility table, helps us escape the trap.

Halls of the Iron Golems

We entered the level in the circular chamber on the low-right and proceeded on the highlighted path. The triangular chamber was where we fought the skeleton and the giant slug. After descending the spiral staircase we found a corridor and a trap door up at a dead-end. We emerged on the stairs to the left and ended in the hexagonal rooms after the split chamber. We needed to reach the circular concentrical place in the center of the map. An amphitheater maybe?

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All in all, a fun weekend full of online gaming. Looking forward to next year's Virtual Greyhawk Con!