Geek Orthodox Indoctrination
Oct. 10th, 2009 09:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theronSo, today was "Take Your Kid To The Dungeon" Day. All in all, it was pretty damned awesome. No, strike the pretty damned part out, it was awesome.
We had a party of seven adventurers. The kids were at level 1 and the adults were "Level 0," which we simulated by removing the daily and some hit points from a first level character.
The adventure was "Coppernight Hold" from Dungeon Delve. Some minor spoilers for that adventure are related below.
The campaign premise, such as it is, has the PCs as members of the Roadwardens, a combination law-enforcement/militia charged with protecting the open countryside between the Scattered Cities. Their commander, Godric sent them to investigate the disappearance of some dwarven miners.
The Flunkies:
Grudd: An illiterate human fighter, obsessed with learning to read, played by my friend Andy.
Aelar: An elven pacifist cleric, who undertook no offensive actions the entire night, played by my friend Rick.
Autumn: A shifter Warden, played by Rick's fiancee Kat.
The Heroes:
Shadow: an Artful Dodger Rogue (played by my son)
Balazar: a Dragonborn Bravura Warlord (played by Andy's son E.)
Ave: a Chaos Sorceress (played by Andy's daughter K.)
Snails: a Druid who spent most of his time in wolf form (played by Rick's son J.)
With seven PCs, even with the flunkies being slightly underpowered, I expected things to go a little easy, but figured with all the first-timers (Kat had never played before either), the numbers would be beneficial.
The first encounter was a relative walk-over. Once the kids figured out the minions were easy pickings, they concentrated on wiping them out. The high point of the encounter was probably Shadow using Positioning Strike with a shuriken and sliding one of the Slingers into the pit. Grudd was set on fire briefly, but came through slightly singed.
The second encounter was much harder fought. Autumn figured out the statue was a possible trap and used it on the kobolds before they could spring it on the party. However, the tapestry traps worked almost as planned, causing Grudd some fair inconvenience.
Ave rolled a 1 on her attacks not once but twice, causing chaos as she pushed friend and foe across the battlefield. Shadow learned the joy of Reliable dailies when his handspring assault failed him not once but twice.
The final encounter was surprisingly easy, though not anticlimactic. Just announcing the presence of a dragon was enough to get all the wavering attention spans back online. Shadow finally successfully used his handspring assault to nail one of the Slyblades for something like 35 points of damage in a single hit. Too late I realized it could have used its Sly Dodge to spin the damage off on a minion, but really, given his lousy luck with the power the two previous attempts, it would have been a really cheap move to do that.
The remaining minions and the unwounded Slyblade did a fine job of harrying the heroes while the Dragon moved in to breath. When it did, it managed a pretty decent attack, hitting about half the party fairly hard. A weakened Snails got dropped by a minion, but Balazar used his daily (Reckless Rescue) to save him. Meanwhile Ave drew a bead on the dragon and let loose with her Dazzling Ray, which, combined with some earlier damage, dropped him like a rock. Shadow finished off the Slyblade he'd wounded at the outset, while the other one dropped Autumn. Fortunately, Aelar was nearby, so death was averted. Ave blasted the remaining Slyblade and that was the end.
But that's only part of the tale. The rest was the laughing and joking and making up little character and story bits, and eating pizza and drinking Jones D&D Sodas and doing all the stuff I've been doing for over 30 years now and indoctrinating the next generation. And it was a blast. I can't wait until we do it again.
We had a party of seven adventurers. The kids were at level 1 and the adults were "Level 0," which we simulated by removing the daily and some hit points from a first level character.
The adventure was "Coppernight Hold" from Dungeon Delve. Some minor spoilers for that adventure are related below.
The campaign premise, such as it is, has the PCs as members of the Roadwardens, a combination law-enforcement/militia charged with protecting the open countryside between the Scattered Cities. Their commander, Godric sent them to investigate the disappearance of some dwarven miners.
The Flunkies:
Grudd: An illiterate human fighter, obsessed with learning to read, played by my friend Andy.
Aelar: An elven pacifist cleric, who undertook no offensive actions the entire night, played by my friend Rick.
Autumn: A shifter Warden, played by Rick's fiancee Kat.
The Heroes:
Shadow: an Artful Dodger Rogue (played by my son)
Balazar: a Dragonborn Bravura Warlord (played by Andy's son E.)
Ave: a Chaos Sorceress (played by Andy's daughter K.)
Snails: a Druid who spent most of his time in wolf form (played by Rick's son J.)
With seven PCs, even with the flunkies being slightly underpowered, I expected things to go a little easy, but figured with all the first-timers (Kat had never played before either), the numbers would be beneficial.
The first encounter was a relative walk-over. Once the kids figured out the minions were easy pickings, they concentrated on wiping them out. The high point of the encounter was probably Shadow using Positioning Strike with a shuriken and sliding one of the Slingers into the pit. Grudd was set on fire briefly, but came through slightly singed.
The second encounter was much harder fought. Autumn figured out the statue was a possible trap and used it on the kobolds before they could spring it on the party. However, the tapestry traps worked almost as planned, causing Grudd some fair inconvenience.
Ave rolled a 1 on her attacks not once but twice, causing chaos as she pushed friend and foe across the battlefield. Shadow learned the joy of Reliable dailies when his handspring assault failed him not once but twice.
The final encounter was surprisingly easy, though not anticlimactic. Just announcing the presence of a dragon was enough to get all the wavering attention spans back online. Shadow finally successfully used his handspring assault to nail one of the Slyblades for something like 35 points of damage in a single hit. Too late I realized it could have used its Sly Dodge to spin the damage off on a minion, but really, given his lousy luck with the power the two previous attempts, it would have been a really cheap move to do that.
The remaining minions and the unwounded Slyblade did a fine job of harrying the heroes while the Dragon moved in to breath. When it did, it managed a pretty decent attack, hitting about half the party fairly hard. A weakened Snails got dropped by a minion, but Balazar used his daily (Reckless Rescue) to save him. Meanwhile Ave drew a bead on the dragon and let loose with her Dazzling Ray, which, combined with some earlier damage, dropped him like a rock. Shadow finished off the Slyblade he'd wounded at the outset, while the other one dropped Autumn. Fortunately, Aelar was nearby, so death was averted. Ave blasted the remaining Slyblade and that was the end.
But that's only part of the tale. The rest was the laughing and joking and making up little character and story bits, and eating pizza and drinking Jones D&D Sodas and doing all the stuff I've been doing for over 30 years now and indoctrinating the next generation. And it was a blast. I can't wait until we do it again.