Monday, June 27, 2022

D&D Session 43 (6/22/22): Slaughter At White River

Text by Paul O'Connor, Dungeon Master


Caught between a defended ford and a thundering herd of cannibal Wolf Tribe barbarians, our heroes gird up their loins for the grim task ahead.

A halfling thief, a wizard, and a half-orc barbarian -- with a frost giant, a reluctant barbarian, and an adolescent owlbear to support them -- faced off against far superior numbers. A frost druid and his tribal champion companion, a fierce berserker, a towering yeti, slavering lycanthropes, and a whole clan of tribal spearmen. Good luck!



The druid showed his hand early -- raining hale and jagged ice far and wide. Sarkagan took the worst of it, and when the Wolf Tribe berserker singled out the wizard, fairly vaulting across the battlefield to clobber him with his axe, it looked bad for the good guys.

But our heroes got their feet under them. Sarkagan quaffed a healing potion, and the giant Harshnag lifted the little wizard up onto his mighty shoulder, where he might better concentrate on what he does best -- blowing fearsome pipes and blowing stuff up. 

Meanwhile, Blah threw caution to the winds and sprinted through the druid's bodyguards to lay into the enemy spellcaster, heedless of the spears and axes arrayed against him.  Stunned by this turn of events, the druid shifted to defensive mode, first failing to escape by transforming into an owl, then relying on magic fog and stealth spells to quit the battlefield. Blah's impetuous attack took the Wolf Tribe's most important piece off the battlefield, and that Blah also beat the tribe's champion and a score of spearmen seemed almost a bonus.



Meanwhile, from atop the towering giant, Sarkagan routed half the field with his damn pipes, then wreathed Harshnag in a wall of fire, which drove back the weres and spearmen yapping at his heels. Arthur tumbled here and there about the battlefield and put paid to the enemy berserker in single combat. Before long the field was a confused mass of burning lycanthropes and fleeing, fear-maddened spearmen. A few got across the ford; more plunged to their deaths in the swift-flowing White River.



With Mal-Do yelling that enemy horsemen were fast approaching from the south, the team mounted up and fled across their hard-won ford, with Sarkagan frustrating pursuit with a wall of water cast across the ford, securing the only line of pursuit like a magical cork in a bottle.

On to Sommpher's Rest!

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