Kuunari

At Gencon, some friends and I got together and played a bit of D&D.  I decided to let them explore Fallow’s Vale, the small sandbox campaign I’ve run sporadically up in Minnesota.  Needless to say, fun was had (I hope!)

It started off with Thergood the mage, A bullywug Druid and a Dragonborn Paladin travelling towards Fallow’s Vale from Riversport, which is about a half days travel down the mountain from Fallow’s Vale.  They ran into some Kobold and human bandits, who tried to trick them by pretending to be recently attacked travelers.  After defeating the bandits, they discover one of the Kobolds had a long sword with the symbol of the Order of the Flame on it, the Dragonborn Paladin’s order. The paladin might have stabbed the kobold in the crotch to gather more information.  It was not successful.

Looking into the matter in Fallow’s Vale led the heros’ to believe the Paladin had gone into the mountains south of the city to fight evil a year ago.  Nothing had been heard of him since.

After being rewarded by the Watch in Fallow’s Vale for defeating and capturing the bandits, they set off to track the bandits back to their lair.  Instead, they fall into a trap, and nearly die from swarms and a stirge.  It turned out the trap led to an abandoned Temple to Lloth.  So of course the adventurers had to investigate.

They returned the next day with the bullywugs adopted brother, a Thri-keen monk, and a dwarven fighter to bolster their forces.  They mapped the temple a bit and discovered a bit of the history of the place, but were set upon by a Gelatinous Cube and then some more spider swarms.  They luckily vanquished both. Within the Gelatinous Cube they discovered a symbol of the Order of the Flame, leading them to believe that the paladin met his untimely end here.  And found a secret door in the wall which was opened by touching the third leg on both sides of the spider symbol.  They also uncovered a passage that they suspect will lead into the Underdark, a place none of them were too keen to enter just yet.

Leaving the temple, they continued following the tracks to the bandits hide out.  Thergood the Mage and the bullywug both scouted on ahead and were abushed.  They took care of their enemies, but were then shoot at out of the woods.  They retreated to the temple of lloth, where after a short rest, they were hailed by Karl the Bandit King.  They tried to go out the back way, but Karl caught them, and invited them to a feast, while they were surrounded by about 15 of his bandits.  Karl was the shortest kobold they had ever seen, wearing a crown much too large for his head that tilted to one side.

The negotiations did not go well, but luckily the dragonborn came out of hiding just in time to turn the tide of battle.  They were all hurting, and near death, but after defeating Karl, they broke the will of the rest of the bandits, and those they didn’t kill or capture ran away. Karl told them that a drow named D’ gave him the Sword, and it had been stolen from him by one of his bandits.   He wouldn’t tell them any more as he seemed more fearful of the drow than of death.

They returned to Fallow’s Vale to a heroes welcome for vanquishing the Bandit King.