Barrowmaze Open Table Sessions 27-29

Session 27

Players

Barmox the Magic-User, played by Stripe
Glarg the Fighter, played by Trusty McGurk
Rocco the Fighter, played by Daryl
Robber Key the Thief, played by Robert
Sena the Ranger, played by Malley
Sky the Druid, played by Captain Caveman

Summary

Krothos sends goons to search after Sena, apprehending magic items to provide to Mazzahs the town mage for divination purposes. The party decides to relocate to bogtown. One the way they are approached by a witch-hunter from the church named Magnus Raich, and his quarry, a supposed binder of demons named Lennard.

Suspecting foul play, the group attacks this hunter in the night, slaying him and releasing his captive, who is a deacon from Bogtown, and an enemy of the Bishop of Aerik. The group sets him off towards Helix, telling him to find the Chapel of St. Ygg there.

Off of the corpse of the witch hunter the party retrieves a wand of paralysis, cloak of elven kind, and a supplied. They proceed to Bogtown and meet many of the locals. They meet with the Mother of Toads, the local wizard. They stop into the Toasty Troll Inn and Glarg and Key make quick friends with some scoundrels, hinting that they are looking for work, they are sent to a chapel to St. Ygg, obviously a front for criminal activity.

In attempted subtle fashion, the “priest” says that the current “pope” is unfit for duty, given over to extravagances and a up-and-coming “cardinal” would very much like the head of their “church” disposed of by outsiders, with a wink and a nudge.

They are then pointed to a shrine to Janus out in the Bog, and instructed of a ritual that may transport worshippers to a sister-shrine in the barrowmarsh or back, for a sacrifice of wealth or goods.

Session 28

Players

Barmox the Magic-User, played Stripe
Boris the Barbarian, played by Modest Mace
Glarg the Fighter, played by Trusty McGurk
Lathan the Half-Elf, played by Ragnar
Robber Key the Thief, played Robert
Sena the Ranger, played by Malley
Sky the Druid, played by Captain Caveman

Summary

The party investigates Mecit Manor, traversing through the haunted estate, stumbling upon a corpse in a yellow-mold filled bed, encountering violent fungi, ghouls, and an easily-scared ghost butler, who startles Sena forcing her to run. In her sprinting she steps through some water-damaged floorboards and falls through to a torture chamber below. She spends rounds cowering in the dark before getting her wits about her and using her magic rope to climb back up.

Bertelan the Butler tells the party that the manor of the house, Lamric Mecit is upstairs. They find small demonic creatures trashing the furniture in the estate, and poor Boris the Barbarian is defaced by one of the chaotic creatures.

Twisting a series of crow sculptures on a display in the room a secret passage is opened to the master bedroom, mired in filth with the windows boarded up. The sheets are thrown off the bed by the being resting upon it, Lord Lamric in full regalia, even wearing boots to bed.

He accused the party of awaking him, but Ragnar says that they have traveled long from Barrowmaze, bringing the Mecit family blade home.

Overjoy the young lord asks them to hand it over and breaks out some brandy to celebrate, mentioning of further quests he has for the party to fulfill. The entire party is very apprehensive, and after some investigating, sneaking, and mind reading they realize the lord is not as he appears, so Ragnar leaps into battle, striking the creature.

The young lord is transformed before the group’s eyes into an eight-foot tall woman in decrepit clothing, with ruinous claws and hatefull eyes. All the adventurers leap in to slay her, but she is able to shift in and out of the material realm, avoiding their blows. Barmox steps up and uses his wand of paralysis, disabling the creature just enough for the party to decapitate the crone.

For their reward the party finds a massive horde of jewels and a silvered dining set, and they retrieve a massive oil painting of the manor, selling it to the “head grocer” in Bogtown.

Session 29

Players

Barkface the Druid, played by EvilTables
Barmox the Magic-User, played by Stripe
Lathan the Half-Elf, played by Ragnar
Robber Key the Thief, played by Robert
Sky the Druid, played by Captain Caveman

Summary

The party continues their search of Mecit Manor. Deciding to investigate the attached Wizard’s tower. They encounter haunted rooms along the way, acquiring a log of the manor and spell scrolls. Entering into the trapped tower, a wizard’s assistant named Humfra shouts down from the second floor that if there are any spiders with them, he will release the dogs, referring to a chained collection of ghasts and ghouls.

Ragnar casts Charm Person on this being, and learns that the wizard Orias sleeps deep in the earth, having been blessed by the Dark Lord with vampirism. They ask to be led to his study, a library and alchemical lab on the third floor, noting all the windows having been blacked out. They spy a multitude of potions, a spellbook on a plinth, and a chest full of wealth. They also are seen by a crow, and Humfra confirms this to be his master’s familiar.

Barmox asks for Humfra to bring the creature closer to him, and while the one-eyed assistant is warning the crow to not try pecking out his good eye, Barmox sleeps the both of them. They slay the familiar, bound and gag the assistant, and kill off the undead guards of the tower.

Barkface detects danger in the room from the book, the chest and some potions, and worries that the master would know of the familiar’s death, so the group decides to aim for slaying the vampire sooner rather than alter.

Entering into the basement they see a variety of barrels stored under the tower. They enter through two double doors and into a barracks filled with rat men. A deadly melee is engaged, multiple party members are struck by the ferocious creatures, but the Druids cast heat metal on their chain, burning many of them and forcing the creatures to run. Barmox’s wand comes in handy yet ago, disabling many of the combatants.

Deciding they are too injured to proceed, they return to the tower, collecting the potions that did not detect as dangerous, carefully grabbing the tome without touching it, and plundering the vampire’s chest for a ransom of gems, platinum, and electrum.

They decide to camp out in the woods overnight, fearing that the vampire will travel to Bogtown seeking revenge.

Barrowmaze Open Table Session 26

Summary

Quite a few new adventurers enter into the fray as the party returns to their initial entrance to the Barrowmaze. Therein they battle with stirges supping on a recently deceased adventurer. They discover a secret shrine to a demonic patron, and a magic-user pledges service to an unnamed entity asking to be led to the thief that took his scroll. In pursuit of this scoundrel, the group witnesses a massive Beastfolk, several times larger than they usually encounter as it immediately rushes them, trying to tear the adventurers limb from limb. After a bit of trying to sprint around it they group enters into combat, pinning the beast in a doorway and eventually dispatching it. Late into the night Sena uses her Ring of Invisibility to break into Krotho’s manor, leaving the head of the beastfolk in his chambers, torching his undergarments in the hall before sneaking out.

Cast

Player Characters

Barmox the Magic-User, played by Stripe
Glarg Grumblebeard, played by Trusty
Jollen the Druid, played by Xenken
Key the Thief, played by Robert
Rocco the Fighter, played by Daryl
Sena the Ranger, played by Malley
Slaine the Hermit, played by Dio

Hirelings

Manks the Cleric of Hathor

Rewards

3 sapphires worth 600gp
A coin-purse of 50gp
A bag full of chipped jewels worth 200gp
A silver dagger designed for ritualistic sacrifice
187.5 total party combat xp

Thoughts

It was a good game, a little hectic given that we had 5 new players. I need to remember to both instigate a Caller when we have lots of players, and to actively utilize them. Even when I have a caller I often forget and respond to absolutely everyone.

I also know due to the size of the game a few players had technical difficulties and unfortunately missed some of the material, which I feel bad about. I think this is unfortunately just chalked up to Discord, each person’s individual setup, and Roll20, but if anyone has recommendation I’d love to hear them.

There were a few questions of utilizing Floating Disc, a notoriously specific spell, in a very general fashion. While I love creativity, I do think the specifics of a spell is kind of a social contract. Some requested exampled were to use it as a wedge for a door, or as a bludgeoning device. Both are clever interpretations of the spell, but why I ruled against those is that it somewhat mitigates the usability things like Hold Portal or Magic Missile. That said, I’m always game for suggestions.

Overall I enjoyed it, but I do feel like I should move back to my policy of trying to keep at most 6 players. When playing online really my sweet spot is 3-5 players. I love being able to share this game with lots of people, but I also think that my strengths as a ref lay in kind of my free formy conversational manner, which can cause a lot of downtime when the table is packed.

Anyway, thank you for reading, and hopefully this shorter format will help me stay on pace with play reports.

Barrowmaze Open Table Catch-Up 15-25

The amount of session reports that I am “behind” on is almost a large than ones I have written – the last one was for October 11th. Since then there has been 16 Sundays (not including the most recent which I’ll write its own report for). Out of those 5 were missed sessions, most for holidays, my birthday, and just general end of the year stuff.

So that means I am missing reports for sessions 15-25. Of course there’s no way I’ll be able to summarize those, track down exactly everyone who played, etc. but I’ll try to very, very briefly outline what happened so I can pick up regular reporting again. I won’t be able to highlight everything but here’s some details:

The party stole a fantastic painting out of the noble’s tomb, and Sky the Druid used some mind-reading to deftly negotiate with H.H.R. Huffnpuff for a massive sum of wealth.
Removing the painting released a vault extending into some caves, releasing a hulking biped insectoid monster that they manage to dash away from.
Ambushed by a rival adventuring party, the group aggressively charges and slays two of their adversaries, scaring off the remaining three and claiming the fallen’s magic items for themselves.
While investigating a sole tomb, Ragnar the Half-Elf touched an ominous tome and was transported away to an alien realm to do battle with a small grey sorcerer atop a floating throne. Striking the magic-user twice, Ragnar was returned to the tomb with access to the tome.
The group discovered a demonic brazier that seems to extinguish flame.
Returning to the site of a previous massacre – the water logged tomb filled with a diorama of an elven warrior battling lizardmen, Sena the Ranger used her rope of climbing to remove the sword while the party ducked out of the tomb before the statue guardians attacked.
Sena continued her construction of a canal to the mounds, and as it neared completion some of her laborers came to her panicked that many decided to plunder a nearby religious site for a frog cult, after hearing the monks left for a pilgrimage, but were lost within.
The party traversed the magical threats in the tomb, with Martin the Cleric using wards to protect them from rampaging Frogoyles, finding the lost laborer who was infected with some sort of frog curse, the holy man exorcised it from the poor man’s body.
One of their hirelings was eaten whole by a mummified frogman, and the party fled sealing the dead within, burning religious iconography as they beat their retreat.
Barmox the Magic-User found some very enlightening weed and pipe in the shrine, and returned to share it with Huffnpuff, gaining magical insights as he took a deep hit.
Sky befriended a diseased alpha rat, and led it on many adventures before it was consumed by green slime.
They party found an ever-flowing cup, producing holy water, ale, or mead, or even sometimes potions. Two party members were slain by stone guardians in its retrieval.
The group stumbled upon corpses ambulated by a swarming mass of rotgrubs. After deadly combat Sky’s faithful mutt Foamy was found panting with the foul swarm digging into her skin. Sky immediately enacted dagger-surgery to get them out, narrowly saving his dog.
The group plundered an ancient library of an old pestilence cult, but not before battling with the entombed high priest who drained some of Lathan’s lifeforce. Their rewards were hundreds of pounds of books they were able to make a good exchange for, and a multitude of magical incenses, powders, and salves.
Sena’s canal ended, and Krothos the local lord immediately set to taxing it, giving the party 1 free pass on the canal as a reward. Sena punched his advisor, and Krothos let them off with a warning, heading off to drink and gamble.

Tons more occurred in addition to the above. As I go through my notes I’ll return here to add, but for now I think this is a decent summary. I apologize that I haven’t catalogued everyone who played in these games, and my apologies if I haven’t highlighted one of your favorite moments, but I definitely encourage you to comment if you played or remember any details and I’ll update this post.

Later this week I’ll write up the most recent session, and hopefully get caught up on my Open Table Valley of the Wind Game.

Thank you!

Barrowmaze Open Table Session 14

Summary

Finding their way into an old noble’s tomb, a wizard is possessed by the spirit of an ancient squire and joins forces with their liege wraith. The party’s courageous self-proclaimed knight is cursed with ghostly undeath by the lord’s blade, and the oddly-friendly skeleton swears fealty to him as he fades from the mortal realm. A thief is found wandering the tomb, having fallen into a portal trap elsewhere, and the party enters into combat with the approaching death cultists and their zombie horde.

details follow

Barrowmaze Open Table Session 13

Summary

The party explores a mound further east atop the marsh, discovering a secret entrance further into the maze below. There the battle with gigantic centipedes, the unquiet dead of necrotic priests, and hear the howling of an unearthly wolf deep within the tomb.

session report follows

Barrowmaze Open Table Session 12

edit: I accidentally listed Gamdar as dead when I meant Garbash, too many G clerics – this has been corrected below

Summary

Our group acquires some new allies, returns to the tomb, leaps over some fire beetles, suffers loses, and finds the hidden sarcophagus of an ancient druid.

session report follows

Barrowmaze Open Table Session 11

Summary

The players gain two new allies, traverse more of the maze, engage in a brief chase, and meet a skeleton that doesn’t quite understand its unliving condition.