Session 4
Previous AARs:
Case of Characters
Player Characters
- Beep - Thief 3, Halfling, played by Soddentowel
- Evara - Thief 3, transformed into a Hagamido Saurian, played by Gwenchant
- "Red" Kolva - Thief 3, played by Socrates
- Steve - Wizard 3, Human, played by Soddentowel
- Zago - Wizard 3, Goblin, played by Socrates
- Zaphiel - Cleric 3, Elf, played by Gwenchant
NPCs
- Gasatano - Fighter, Hagamido Saurian
- Polima - Wizard, Hagamido Saurian
- Malita - Cleric of Bufamela-Sa, Hagamido Saurian
Events
In walking through the Gate to the Land of the Dead to exit Bufamela-Sa's dream, Evara was the only one who decided to accept his offer to become a Hagamido. She gave up her Orcish ancestry, and in return became a Hagamido (crested saurian).
The party transitions to the last room in the crypt they had been in, with Gasatano, Polima, and Malita. They talked. The Hagamido noted the state of the crypt, particularly troubling to Malita as a priest of the dead. Malita shared that when she entered the crypt just before entering Bufamela-Sa's dream, the temple existed on a great plains, but that Kepe-Sa did something to save the temple and the world by moving it to where it was now. She asked where it was, and the PCs told her it was now at the top of a mountain. Unfortunately, Malita couldn't say what exactly was done.
They decided to back track the party's route, back to the room with the two fire goblins. Malita's reaction to them was hostile, and Gasatano backed her up. Zag and Zog freaked out and started screaming and brandishing their spears at the saurians.
Zago tried to negotiate a peace, which was exacerbated by the fire goblin's sergeant yelling from the other room asking for a status update. He opened the door Zag and Zog were guarding, backed by eight troopers, and pointed out that he didn't care that this had once been a crypt of the Hagamido, they had abandoned it long ago. Malita took Zago's advice, and backed down, and the party moved up the stairs to the level they had entered through, back to what Malita called "The Captain's Hall".
They returned through the upper well room ("Hall of Explorers"). Malita noted that there was a tool in the room to the north which she wanted to use, but that they didn't have a key. Malita noted that the caretaker of the crypt would have the keys, and started to the west.
They returned to the room with the tunnel they had entered through ("North Annex"), and was particularly disturbed by the tunnel's existence. She was further disturbed by the corpse of the caretaker. They took the keys from the corpse, and returned to the Hall of Explorers, then tried keys to open the north door, to get into the Traveller's Tomb. This was another crypt room, but had a telescope set up on a post on a pedestal. Malita went to look through it, but waited as Zago (I think?) got there first, and looked through first. The nearest few miles of matter were seen through, and terrain beyond could be seen. Oddly, looking to the southwest, at the village of Tressagros, they could see the village as normal, but with a purple aura around it. Malita stepped up next, manically examining all around, also noting the purple aura of Tressagros, before giving up. She stepped back, resigned. Zago asked about the auras, and she explained that Hagamido settlements would have had a yellow aura, and other saurian settlements would have had an orange aura. She didn't see either.
After Malita collected herself emotionally, Malita stated that they should go to see the Overguard, and started leading the party in that direction. They returned to the North Annex, moved through the south door, into the lobby, noting a door to the west and stairs up to the east, and through the south door to the South Annex, mirroring the layout of the North Annex. The mirroring was to the point that there was a crack in the south wall, where a secret door had been which had contained a cage made of mithril, which had been crushed by a cave in, which had burst the secret door, crushed the cage, and splintered a huge crystal as well as destroying a number of books. Steve identified the crystal as having been an enormous diamond, knowing that diamonds are often used for arcane rituals, and cage's metal as mithril.
Gasotano noted to Malita in the Hagamido language that goat tracks entered the room to the west, but did not come back. Malita clearly wanted to go to the west, but was gravely concerned about what was to the east, and decided to go that way. Nobody else in the party objected.
They entered another unnaturally dim rectangular room, the Hall of Scholars, which mirrored the Hall of Explorers, with a door to the south ("The Author's Hall") instead of to the north, and a door directly to the east ("The Sages' Hall"). They used their keys to unlock the door to the Author's Hall. This room gave up a row of crypt berths to instead have a book show above each tier of berths. In the center of the room, on a pedestal was a wooden box about the size of a bread box, with a brass box on each end. Steve examined it, and noted fine gold lines inside. Evara took a book at random, a fictional account about a pair of young Hagamido males who engage on a river journey on a raft.
They then returned to the Hall of Scholars to enter the Sages' Hall to the east. This was another circular room mirroring the layout of the Captain's Hall, but without a set of stairs. Interestingly, there was an insubstantial grey disk hovering over an insubstantial grey Hagamido floating in the center of the room, with half a dozen Archaeopteryxes--half jet black, half chalk white--swooping around it, occasionally flying through its head. It initially takes no notice of them, but they engage with it. As each person engages with it, it asks them a series of questions:
- What are you doing here?
- Are you living or dead?
- What do you think the true nature of living is?
- What do you think the true nature of the afterlife is?
- What duty do the dead have to the living?
They interact with it for a bit, discussing these topics (especially Zago, who is very introspective on these topics), until Steve brings up what it wants with the living, at which point it remembers it wants to feel blood flowing through it and turns hostile. They engage with it, but it doesn't seem to get damaged. They decide to retreat, and it doesn't follow.
We ended the session with their return to the Hall of Scholars.
Evaluation
What Went Well
- I think I balanced moving things forward with Malita while leaving room open for the party to act, react, and choose to dissent.
- I felt the tension and conversation between the fire goblins and the Hagamido via Zago went well, and was more entertaining and revealing than my dry summary.
What Could be Improved
- I totally cocked up the encounter with the Grey Ponderer in the Sages' Hall. Partly, I had forgotten that the Archaeopteryxes could enter someone's skull to pull out information, which I should've used to move the conversation forward.
- It being insubstantial and so 75% resistant to non-magical non-silver weapons really caused a drag in the combat. On the one hand, that means they could choose to go back. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure Gwenchant felt frustrated and disengaged after Zephiel failed all her spellchecks.
- I should encourage the players to consider searching crypt berths, or asking Malita where they could get magical weapons from, although she might be against getting weapons buried with particular people. On the other hand, she's made it clear that she knows where things are within the crypt.
Unresolved Threads
- What happened to the other Hagamido?
- What are the fire goblins up to, beyond setting up a colony outside of the elemental plane of fire?
- What happened to the crypt?
Further Thoughts on Shadowdark
- Spells get cast more often:
- On the plus side, this means casters feel more empowered.
- On the down side, casters tend not to think about what they'll do when they're out of spells.
- It plays faster than Old School Essentials or Swords and Wizardry.
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