Never Mind Control the Unluckiest Adventurer

Wednesday I decided enough is enough and level skip everyone in my DnD campaign. My other campaign just got cancelled due to inconsistent scheduling and I was just two levels away from getting my second job class (called a paragon class).

So now everyone is level 11, ripe for their paragon classes, and some decide to even craft new characters to try new classes, especially the new ones introduced with the new primal power source. Ron, for example, scrapped his ranger in favor of the new druid class.

But this wasn't all about giving my players a new sense of power at level 11. No, with my players at level 11, I could now throw much more interesting monsters at them! Case in point, the Exalted Brain in a Jar.

I didn't have much of a story. Just throw together a flimsy excuse to start a fight. New guilds breaking the rules? Ok, we're in a guild too, so let's show'em how its done! Then, throw a big zombie pack at them as a feint to get them used to the new powers. Then, suddenly, bam! Someone just got dominated out of nowhere. In other words, brainwashed by a mysterious, as of seen entity.

By dominating Ron's druid, I could command him to attack his own allies in addition to attacking them directly with the Brain's psychic attacks. Unfortunately, Ron was terrible at throwing his dice, because he kept throwing twos and threes on his attacks. It was the equivalent of just putting Ron to sleep and having him become useless rather then brainwashing him and turning him against each other. 

Planar travels: To the Shadowfell

An alternate idea I have for traveling through the caverns would be an accidental misstep into the Shadowfell.

Minding your own business, an unfortunately step into a patch of darkness which turns out to be a active portal into the Shadowfell. This could be a replacement idea to what I was originally going for the original encounters to take place in.

While in the Shadowfell, you'd obviously want to find a way back. On your travels through the dark barren wasteland, you may run into a questionable looking caravan light by ominous green torches. Do you decide approach them for help, or avoid them in case they could be marauders?

Manual of the Planes

I've recently spotted Manual of the Planes in the wild at my local Borders Express in my mall. Looks like an interesting get as it will further my ideas of inserting some planar environments into my campaigns like random portals and the monsters that inhabit such places.

Expect to see some extra planar action sometime in the future!

More spoilers: the deep, dank, and dark

Sorry, but another spoiler. I love them! My last one was on what you may fight. This time, I'll be going over what you'll be experiencing.

Spoilers ahead: Next D&D session

Spoilers ahead. If you want to see, go here

Know your lore #1: The underworm and the underdark

Time to understand what the hell I'm throwing at you. Party members might be wondering what exactly is going on, before forgetting why they were wondering about that when they need to face down some serious monsters.

Though Gears of War 2 had a hand in inspiring the layout, I swear I thought of this concept a few days before finding out about that level. At any rate...

The underworm is a massive creature that most scholars have never seen, let alone heard of. Because it lives underground as if it were the depths of the deepest seas, few have ever seen it in it's entirety.
It eats whatever it can swallow with it's maw. It'll even break down earth for the minerals when it can. It's digestive juices will break down anything, but the time it takes to do so varies from food to food.
It has a blowhole similar to cetaceans, which it uses to take in air whenever it's in short supply deep underground.
The underworm tends to be passive when it comes to food. It doesn't actively hunt per se, but it does employ ambush tactics and surprises to swallow most of it's prey whole.

Two main monster attractions within is the giant heart and the white blood cells.
The white blood cell is of course, the main bulk of self-defense within the underworm. Their first and most used tactic is to simply slide on their way, and engulf whatever is in it's path. If anything's left after it swallows one creature, it relies on slamming it's body, particular with the extra momentum of a victim, to subdue other intruders until it digests it's engulfed target.

The giant heart can't move, but it's has a long reach, and has a number of reaction mechanisms to protect itself from harm.

Just like the surface, the underground is brimming with life. Many communities are built underneath the sun's reach, and just like the surface, their are adventurers underground too. The most common adventurer underground is an explorer, usually a cave cartographer. One who makes a living charting the twisting pathways and caves so future travellers don't get lost or run into dangerous creatures. Lighting the darkest reaches are settlements meant to act as safe havens for these explorers, usually founded near an exit point to the surface.

Recap: 12/09/08

After a restful night in a cave, you return to the white dragon's corpse to prompt grave rob the shit out of it. Normandie takes 50 good dragon scales while Roc drains a good liter of dragon's blood. After a good while of looting, the aura of the former dragon which has diffused for a good while starts to appear as a bone chilling fog that congealed over their skin, freezing Roc and Tenma halfway.

After some additional tromping, they arrived at a campsite at a dead end of the cavern. Roc decides to stealth in and finds two snow bandits sleeping in a tent. After disarming them, Roc decides the only course of action is to wake them up, to which they respond by tackling him to the ground. After the group runs over and quickly pitied d'ose foos, the ground opened up from beneath them, dropping them into what appears to be water.

Of course, it wasn't water. Roc found out it was some sort of corrosive liquid and everyone started their creative solutions. Normandie got onto her floating disc, Drey flew out, while Yogi made like Micheal Phelps. Darius wasn't so lucky, but never fear! It's only a plot device!

After walking further into the gullet of some sort of giant beast, the party meets a Drow who tells them they are inside an underworm. They meet up with the eccentric, Farrus, who concocts a plan to escape the worm using the strength of the newly assembled adventurers. His former "helper," a dragonborn named Caius joins the party, and they begin their way to destroy the heart of the beast in order to make escaping out the maw easier.

After a lengthy but seemingly unchallenging battle, our adventurers escape out the maw with the help of Caius' strength opening it by himself. With a small dungeoneering check, Drey makes out a worn path and alongthe way, torches lighting the way in the underground. Our party stumbles onto a safe haven for underground cartographers.

D&D Ground Rules

I want to set some ground rules for future D&D sessions for my campaign that I feel should be under my reins but aren't.

• Memorize or at least, comepletely understand, your most used power. In most cases, this would mean your level 1 Daily power. PLEASE understand how it works so the game doesn't come to a screeching halt.

• For multi-enemy attacks such as blast or burst, I'll decide how many attack rolls you throw according to the power. For example, for Dragon Breath, the player breathes one huge blast of elemental energy, throwing one d20 to compare against each enemy's individual defense. Twin Strike is an example of two seperate, focused attacks using two attack rolls.

• For the Beast Master: I just want to make it clear. You and your pet share one pool of actions except for move actions. You each have one seperate move action to make use of the strategic value of having another creature on the field. Otherwise, the both of you share the same actions. The creature, afterall, doesn't do anything unless your firmly command it to do something.

• I'll begin taking your passive checks more seriously in describing your settings. Your active checks will further flesh out what you can see, feel, hear and so on.

• I'll begin enforcing the right of the DM's ironfirst more now that I've set these preliminary ground rules in place. Basically, if I declare anything, it's because I said so.
  

Recap session 11/24/08

Here's a recap on the loot and plundering...
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Roc: Endless Quiver and Inescapable Weapon

Tenma: Paired Weapon

Drey: Butterfly Sandals and Repulsion Armor

Normandie: Symbol of Vengeance

Darius: Sunblade and Ruby Scabbard

Yogi: Eagle Eye Goggles

I've forgotten who took the Trollhide Bracers. Also, I'm planning on taking away your current battle standard, so be prepared. I am planning on getting Normandie something to balance it out, so don't worry.

Everyone should've gained 333 gp individually and 666 mp individually (magic points, or residuum).

Be ready, because your next encounters will definitely be prepared for 6 people, regardless of who shows up two weeks from now.

The worst is yet to come.

Anyone reading this before D&D, you'll be glad to know you'll be seeing everything, from the unique and weird to ferocious and powerful. I'll post monster cards after the session.