by Thoth Amon » Wed Jan 18, 2012 1:24 pm
I forgot my camera but one of the players took a picture with her camera phone. I will post sometime soon.
The game was set up like this:
The characters are all from the same village. The village elders have been telling everyone that the rain gods are angry as there has been a drought for a few years and the village crops are stunted and far less than usual. Everyone knows the legend of the swamp goblins a few days to the east. There was once a fort in a valley but several hundred years ago the valley started flooding and has become a reeking swamp. The villagers hand carry nasty water from the swamp to help with their crops but without the rains, the village will be depopulated within a couple more years. The characters have heard rumors about some artifact which caused the flooding, and continues to pour forth water. They are determined to find it, thereby saving their village and also making a name for themselves amongst the other villages and tribes of the plains.
The characters travel to the center of the swamp, attracting nothing more sinister than some leaches, which they remove easily enough. The fort is made of stone and is in pretty decent shape, though covered with slime and ick. The double doors are easily opened, the wood is severely rotted and the doors fall right off the hinges when fiddled with.
Upon entering the ruins, the characters get in marching order, light a torch, and kick in the first door they see. Inside the room lair four lizardmen and a lizardman shaman. Kiley (9-year old girl, playing a fighter named Cristal) charges in with her spear to attack. Her uncle, Dan (playing an elf named Elf) speaks up saying it might be a better idea to try to talk to them first but he is too slow with his recommendation and the battle is on. The rest of the party follows in to attack. Within two rounds of combat, one fighter is down and two of the lizardmen break off combat to eat him (DM ruling on my part since the party was getting its ass seriously kicked). The shaman is killed after a few rounds, but not before the cleric is dropped unconscious. Within another couple of rounds, the third fighter is down, and I break off another lizardman to eat him, giving the rest of the party a chance to escape if they want. They stupidly keep fighting, eventually killing 3 of the 4 lizardmen but the entire party is at 1 or 2 HP (those who live). The last lizardman fails his morale check and the party leaves him alone.
They rest up a night and then go to the next room they find. Listening at the door, the elf is surprised when a green slime above him drops and starts dissolving his head. Cristal uses a torch to try to burn the slime, she succeeds but in doing so kills the elf. The players (except the 9-year old) are drunk as skunks by now and wander off.