Maure Castle game in Google+ Hangout

Last Saturday night, and after a year, we got back together to play some Dungeons & Dragons. Thanks to Google+ Hangout, five players from four different countries (Uruguay, Panama, Mexico and Ireland) gathered around a virtual table. I think we're participating in a revolution on how RPGs are being played.

We also took the opportunity to test the Tabletop Forge app ( http://tabletopforge.com/). Everyone liked the app and we successfully used the dice roller and combat tracker, but had some issues with the battle map and one of the players had some problems with his Internet connection (Telmex: you suck!).

The party continued the exploration of the Chamber of Antiquities (Dragon #124), one of the many levels under the ruins of Maure Castle.

Kentsui Inowe, Human (Mnk14)

Quinath Leafholder, Elf (Ftr4/Wiz8/Sps2)

Kamar, Human (Ftr6/EWM1/Ken7)

Kir'Orist Mithalvarin, Elf (Clr9/Lor6)

Jerry, Human (Rog14)

Last session, a year ago, Inowe almost got killed by a creature they identified as a hordling and the party decided to go to the Free City of Greyhawk. There the group contacted former member Orist (cleric of Boccob) and hired the services of Jerry, a skilled rogue. Denar, a cleric of Heironeous, stayed in the city (the player couldn't join the game). The group returned to the castle and picked up where they left. From there they explored a meeting room with an ornated large wooden table surrounded by a dozen of also ornate wooden chairs that bore an stylized M. An iron door led to another room with five statues of armor-clad warriors surrounding a low pedestal. Atop of the pedestal was a crystal box with a sparkling ring inside. Quinath send an unseen servant to retrieve the box, but when it picked it up the statues animated and destroyed the servant. Inowe threw one of the chairs at the box and knocked it from the pedestal, leaving it out of sight. She then tried to hook it with her kama but to no avail. Seen that Quinath cast invisibility on his homunculus and fly on himself. The homunculus flew close to the ceiling (10' high) until it was above the box. Meanwhile Quinath flew also close to the ceiling until he saw the box. The statues animated and two of them closed on Quinath. One of them jumped and managed to land a blow with his bastard sword. Quinath cast levitate on the box and flew from the room, but not before one of the guardians hit him again. The box levitated to the ceiling and the homunculus pushed it towards the door. The guardians followed Quinath but Orist cast stone shape and made a semi-circular 6' high wall on the door to prevent that.

Jerry the rogue examined the box for traps while Kamar stood in guard in case the guardians decided to follow. Quinath cast Grease on the wall in case the guardians managed to climb across. Orist recognized the ring as a Dragon Eye ring. while at it one guardian managed to climb the wall but fell due to the Grease and was hacked down by Kamar. The same fate met the second guardian. Quinath then flew back into the room and cast Cone of Cold on the remaining three guardians. Two reached the wall and one managed to hit Quinath who cast Wall of Fire on them and retreated. Those two guardians climbed the wall and jumped on Kamar who managed to kill one. Orist cast Harm on the other killing him. The remaining guardian returned to his post by the altar and back to stone.

And with that ended the Hangout. :)

Maure Castle session 4 & 5

By some alignement of the palnets we managed to play on two consecutives weekends. We played on Friday 4th which I found it was a nice way to remember E.G.G. on the third anniversary of his death. Moreover because Maure Castle was one of the places he used to visit as a player. We also played on Friday 11th.

I'm just updating the blog because I've been busy with work and with all the preparations for the baby due to come next week! :-)

In the fist session the group continued exploring the Chamber of Antiquities after the effects of a Symbol of Fear on Quinath the fighter/mage were gone. Behind two granite doors, that were magically opened by using a baton of grey granite, they discovered a room full of shelves with almost 100 pairs of varied footwear in type, shape and materials. Detect magic showed nothing. They were about to leave when Kamar the kensai wondered if that footwear allowed to pass through the M-styled symbols without suffering their effects. Everyone else mocked him and dismissed the idea, but he insisted and took a pair that best fit him.

After exploring several more rooms, they reached one with four curiass on their stands and a door. The door was locked so Kamar bashed it, but with the impulse he entered the other room. The walls, floor and ceiling of that room were chaotically painted and produced some unknown efect that he managed to resist. After leaving that room he told the others that maybe those armor were intended to be worn in order to enter the room safely. Again everyone dismissed the idea but this time they just took them and continued exploring.

While the rest were discussing about the amor and the room, Inowe the monk left to explore other rooms. She reached a door ajar and carefully opened it. What was once a storeroom was now just a pile of broken crates and boxes. From another door, also ajar, across the room a hordling attacked Inowe. It almost killed the monk if not for the quick reaction of the rest. The creature came from what once was a laboratory, now completely wrecked. The exploration continued from room to room until they found hidden in a wardrobe another baton, this one made of emerald. With that they left the castle.

But after leaving Kamar tried the found footwear with the magic Symbols only to found he was correct! At the end of the session I decided to award Kamar's player extra XPs for the idea. Denar and Quinath reached level 15.

The next session was a short one. It was more a farewell reunion for Kamar's player who is going abroad for some time but will still be playing via Skype. The game stared with the party navigating the dungeons on their way out. They came across a couple of fiendish morghs. One was turned by Denar the cleric and the other, after paralyzing Inowe, was killed by Kamar. After that they rached the surface safely and, while travelling across the hills to Quinath tower, they found a strange flying creature (a rast) that was mercilesly killed by Quinath with a lighning bolt. The session ended with the party reaching Quinath tower safely.

Until next session!

Maure Castle session 3

Last Friday night the party continued with the exploration of Maure Castle (D&D 3.5e) and here's what happened:

As a final attempt against the hydra, Quinath cast a Summon Monster IX from a scroll. Being a spell above his caster level there was a chance of a mishap. And the mishap happened, but not instantly. I secretely rolled the effect and how many hours will pass before it. The group returned to the tower of Quinath to rest and plan the next incursion into the castle.

It was dawn when the tower was rocked from its foundations, unceremoniously throwing everyone from their beds. Everyone looked outside the window and saw a massive rocky creature towering over the building! Denar took his sword and flying carpet, and flew through his room's window. Kamar also grabbed his sword and met Inowe in the hall. Inowe, using her Abundant Step, took both of them outside. Meanwhile Qiunath, recognizing the creature s an Elder Earth Elemental and possibly the consequense of yesterday's mishap, tried to end it with a Dispel Magic to no avail. The elemental battered the tower with mighty slams.

Quinath teleported himself outside the tower, Denar cast Bear's Endurance on his friend on the ground, Kamar and Inowe charged at the creature. The elemental ignored their attacks, sunk into the ground, emerged next to Quinath and landed an awsome blow on the elf sending him flying backwards. Quinath played the dead one, Denar cast Haste on his friends, Inowe moved between elf and elemental, and tried to trip it, Kamar (now hasted) attacked the monster four times dealina huge amount of damage. This time the elemental didn't ignore him. It turned around and with a backhand slam sent Kamar flying onto the tower's wall, only to kick the slumped kensai like a rag doll. Quinath took advantage of the distraction to cast an Orb of Cold that froze the elemental to death, banishing it to its plane. After Denar healed everyone's wounds they went back to rest.

The next day they went back into Maure Castle to finish the hydra and gain access to th e Chamber of Antiquities. First Inowe used the Mirror Image spell from her Ring of Spell Storing and Quinath cast See Invisibility on it. The she used it again, while Quinath cast Improved Invisibility on him. After that he polymorphed into a rust monster and cautiously aproached the stranded hydra. Inowe was ready to rescue him if necessary. The rest waited. Quinath then touched the hydra, the rust eating away almost a quarter of its body and exposing its igneous core. Before the hydra could react he touched it again and fled back. Another portion of the body rusted away leaving the thing in precarious balance. The hydra blindly launched its attacks that harmed no one. Denar then cast Gren Slime and the burst of acid ate three of the heads leaving four still active. The remainging heads again blindly launched its breath attacks to no avail. Another wave of Green Slime from the cleric and there was no more of the Maure hydra. The path to the chamber was open.

As they ventured into the huge chamber, Quinath was affected by one of the many M's engraved on the floor. Overwhelmed by fear he panicked, dropped his staff and attempted to flee but was held by Kamar, broke free and held again by Inowe. Quinath tried to cast a Teleport to escape but failed and lost the spell. He tried again usin the still active Wind Walk but Denar dismissed it when he saw the elf transforming. Quinath was tied, gagged by Kamar and beaten to unconsciousness by the monk.

I hope we cant play again before the year is over.

Until next session!

Maure Castle game session 2

Two Fridays ago we had our second session of the new Maure Castle campaign but I forgot to write what happened on it.

This session one of the players couldn't be present due to a flu-like feeling, but we managed everything for him to play via Skype. Everyone wanted to see his new character, Kamar the Kensai, in action and it wasn't going to be the same without him playing it. An now into the action...

The party decided not to try to get past the red Guardian Shield and headed back to the stairs that lead to the "Chambers of Antiquities". While passing through the massive chamber of the columns of faces and symbols, they were attacked by a maurid roper. Kamar and Inowe were surprised by the camouflaged creature, but Denar and Quinath reacted quickly enough, casting magic missle and spiritual weapon (the first passed the SR, the second didn't), before the monster lashed its tentacles to them. The tentacles grabbed both Denar and Kamar who overcame its weakening touch, but missed Quinath and Inowe who quickly attacked the tentacles severing them. Kamar, now free, charged at the creature and landed a gruesome hit with his two-handed bastard sword. The creature, to everyone's astonishment, produced new tentacles to replace the severed ones and lashed all of them to Kamar, weakening him and rendering almost immobile. Denar atacked the creature, while Quinath and Inowe freed Kamar again, who concentrated and focused on his inner self (Power Surge) and landed another terrible blow on the maurid roper. After that hit the creature was doomed and was quickly defeated.

Everyone was gladly surprised by the kensai's abilities and carried on. After passing the gray Guardian Shield, going up some stairs and following a long empty corridor, a wide flight of stairs led them to a huge chamber lit by some torches that cast eerie shadows. (The players had a map of the place but didn't remember some details about some things that were annotated on it. And I didn`t refresh their memory either... I wanted to see how thing went.) Quinath decided to explore the "M" symbols engraved on the floor (they we actually Symbols Of ...) surrounded by bookshelves. Although he resisted the effects of the symbols, upon entering the area the rest of the party saw how the gargantuan iron seven-headed hydra, that was resting on an altar in the center of the chamber, animated itself and begun moving towards them!

The group promptly fled the chamber (under the cover of a fog cloud cast by Quinath) as the hydra closed in and reached the stairs but didn't followed them. They waited for some time before looking if the hydra was still there. And it was. Seeing this Denar decided to attack the iron construct with a wave of green slime. I ruled that the slime ate the hydra's metal legs but was destroyed when the incandescent belly of the construct touched it. Since the hydra didn't spot the cleric he was out of sight before it could attack back.

With the hydra unable to move Denar tried another attack on it. This time he went with a blade barrier, but the spell failed and this time the construct did saw him. One head shot a line of cold that hit the cleric taking away almost half of his hit poins and rendering him all numb. Then another head shot a bolt of lightning capturing the cleric in a cage of lightning that kept damaging him. Inowe tried to pull the lightning bars appart only to receive a discharge. She then decided to use her abundant step ability (dimension door) and succesfully freed Denar from his prision. After that the cleric proceeded tu heal himself.

We all enjoyed the session very much because it had a lot of action.

Until next session!

Maure Castle game session 1

The first session of our monthly Maure Castle campaing finnaly took place! It was a couple of weeks ago but I've been with little time to post.

Denar, High Priest of Heironeous, returned to the city of Greyhawk victorious from the crusade that liberated part of the Shield Lands from the gasp of the Old One. He came along with Kammar, the Myrmidon/Kensai, who is in search of his mentor supposedly taken by mininons of Malcanthet the Queen of Succubi. While in the city they met with Quinath Leafholder, the elven Warlock/Defender/Bladesinger and Knight of Luna, and Kentsui Inowe, the Master of Autumn, who were resting from their last adventure: retriving the Tome of the Black Heart from the dungeons of Maure Castle and killing the evil wizard Eli Tomorast. Since they all have motives to return to Maure Castle, they wind-walked back to Quinath's tower in Urnst to plan the next incursion to the castle dungeons.

Most of the session was used to finish some details of the Kensai, put the party together and recap what their characters knew about the castle. Thay also did some exploration of the Statuary looking for ways into other levels. The Guardian Shields are giving them a hard time.

It was a long time since they last played, but now they are on track, excited and hoping gather again soon.

Untl next session!

Past, Actual and Future Campaigns

My Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk (D&D 3.5e) campaign is officially on hold. One of my players got a great job at Google Ireland and left for the lands of the leprechauns. Other two, a couple, are expecting a baby anytime soon and they won't have much free time to play in the near future. I hoped we could finish the module before these events happened but it could not be.

So, last weekend I finally started my new campaign, sandbox-style, set in the Blackmoor region of the World of Greyhawk. I have four players (possibly a fifth one) which two of them are experienced players (one is my wife) and the rest are complete newbies to tabletop RPG games. We're using Labyrinth Lord Core Rules with some classes and spells from the AEC and some house rules. The all-human party is composed by Kratos the Veteran, Vanon Acolyte of Trithereon, Scarlet the Prestidigitator (illusionist), Phillip the men-at-arms (Scarlet's hireling) and Tamryn the thief-wife. We are going to play once every two weeks.

Also, since the guy that went to Ireland was the DM of our Oriental Adventures campaign, that one too is on hold indefinitely. That left three of the guys (one also played in my EttRoG game) without any game. So, I decided, upon my wife suggestion, to resurrect another dormant campaign: Maure Castle (D&D 3.5e).

Yes, I know I said before I was moving away from 3.5e, but the guys are gameless and I'd really like to run those levels. This campaign will see existing characters Denar High Priest of Heironeous, Quinath Leafholder Warlock/Defender and Knight of Luna and Master of Autumn Kentsui Inowe (wife) face the perils of Maure Castle dungeons. They will be joined by another character to be rolled on our first session. We are going to play once a month.

I'm very excited about the future of both campaigns.