The Mythic World of Urd: Bugbears with Boomsticks!

** The Mythic World of Urd Campaign Page **

The following is from the Arcane Alienist himself, summarized in our private social media debriefing chambers.  You can listen to the vox-recording of the Alienist's analyzation of the sessions' misfortunes right here...

After rest and resupplying and the dwarven mine, the party is left with the choice of returning to the keep (and likely having to fight their way past a horde of gnolls) or returning to the unexplored caves in search of the bugbears and gunpowder.

Celestina is able to take a look at the night sky and perform some astrological calculations that indicate the keep is indeed under siege, but the way to the bugbear lair is clear. The party elects to raid the bugbears while they can. Doncha, feeling the siege to be a more pressing matter, takes his leave.

The party reaches the entrance to the bugbear lair to find a crude arch and doorway has been installed in the cave mouth. It is not locked, allowing them to enter quietly. Jessup and Hagle scout down the first corridor and discover three bugbears posted in a dimly lit room. The rest of the party advances but the bugbears hear them coming.

A fight erupts in the corridor, including gunfire, which draws a large mob of more bugbears from somewhere deeper in the cavern. However, the party prevails largely unscathed. One bugbear manages to flee and avoid death for the moment. Before anyone can give chase, Jessup hears calls for help in the opposite directions and notices a set of keys hanging on the wall.

Searching around, the clerics Hedemar and Volker find two cells of prisoners, whom they promptly free. Among them are a pair of merchants and their two guards, a human warrior, three kobold from Hagle’s tribe, four orcs (the last remaining survivors of the Yellow Tusk tribe that were slaughtered and reanimated by the necromancer Viktora Ash), a huge bugbear, a female dwarf, and a male elf.

The bugbear is Huggz, the former leader of the bugbears. He has been deposed by the troll, Ilezal, sent by the Troll King in the wake of the goblins’ and hobgoblins’ defeat. Huggz is angry at being made to share the blame with the leaders of the other groups, stating the bugbears did their jobs effectively. He wants to kill the troll and the bugbears who didn’t stand with him.

The dwarf is Inghilde Irongrit, the sister of the slain patron of the dwarves. She stayed behind with her brother to cover their clan’s escape when the mine was attacked by the bugbears and was captured. Huggz killed her brother, but she begrudgingly agrees to a truce to help the party deal with Ilezal and remaining bugbears.

The elf is Jadai, a wandering aesthetic who was captured while traveling through the forest. He, along with the  humans, kobolds, and orcs also want to help and agree to fight, although the two merchants can only serve as torchbearers. The large group follows Huggz as he leads them to his former chambers, where he assumes they’ll find the troll.

They come upon the passage leading to their destination to find it lined with a maze of gunpowder barrels. As the group begins to carefully negotiate the obstacles, a group of bugbears emerge from hiding farther up the passage and begin shooting with arquebuses. But they aren’t shooting at people; they’re shooting at the barrels!

One bugbear manages an accurate shot and two gunpowder barrels explode, killing three of the orcs and one of the human guards. The three kobolds flee back to the entrance and abandon their new comrades. The rest of the group are able to make it through barrels and reach the bugbears before any others can be detonated. 

The bugbears had concealed themselves in an alcove with a door. As the melee begins, the door opens to reveal a female bugbear - Kizzes, the former mate of Huggz. Behind her is the troll, Ilezal. She fires her arquebus at the nearest target, killing the second human guard and Ilezal begins chanting a spell. A few seconds later, he engulfed the entire alcove with a fireball. 

When the conflagration ends, only Jessup, Roderick, and Harald remain standing, along with Inghilde, Huggz, and the sole surviving orc. Inghilde continues to battle with the last bugbear in the alcove while Huggz and the orc (Duluk) join Harland in an attempt to fight their way into the adjoining room. Huggz seems particularly enraged by the betrayal of his mate, Kizzes. 

Roderick is able to apply magical healing to Hagle and Jadai, but only enough to keep them from bleeding out, not get them conscious. He then heals himself to get back in the fight. Jessup tends to Hedemar and Volker with healing draughts and gets them back on their feet to attend to the other wounded. Inghilde kills the last bugbear.

With an evil laugh, Ilezal casts another spell, creating two duplicate images of himself that make it unclear which is the real troll. The group finally fight past Kizzes and into the room. Each strike against an image causes it to disappear, at last leaving the real Ilezal revealed, but not before he can attack Roderick one last time. Surrounded, he attempts to turn invisible abs flee, but he is not fast enough as Harald and Roderick cut him down.

Huggz says he’ll make a bargain with the group for valuable information if they make him an offer. His tone telegraphs that fed up enough to accept a pittance that will allow him to divulge some secrets. For a gold piece he tells them they are welcome to all of the bugbears’ loot, stored across the corridor and he shows them a secret passage to where they stashed all the gunpowder. He doesn’t know if it’s still there. He then departs.

The merchants and the orc, Duluk, decide to accompany Inghilde back to the mine and to hold the loot for the party until they can claim it, leaving the party to heal its wounds and decide their next move.

The Mythic World of Urd: Gnolls Behind the Knoll

** The Mythic World of Urd Campaign Page **

The following is from the Arcane Alienist's personal session notes, shared here from our private social media.  You can listen to the Alienist himself wax lyrical on the session right here on the Arcane Alienist Podcast!

The party emerges from the owlbear’s den to find their horses skittish and spooked. Fortunately this is warning enough that they are not surprised when two groups of gnolls sping up from hiding on either side of them and close to attack. To the south, four gnolls have a clear path to the party; to the north, four more gnolls are blocked by party’s gathered mounts.

The first group of gnolls closes in amid a volley of gunfire and sling stones. Doncha, Roderick, and Dolly advance and face them in melee combat, along with Hagle.

The second group of gnolls set upon the horses, who begin to panic. Three horses bolt. Jessup and Dominique are able to reach their mounts and move to round up the fleeing animals. Celestina moves to mount her horse, but a gnoll kills it. She backs up and finds Roderick’s warhorse instead. Hedemar and Volker also reach their horses.

Harland mounts his giant lizard and charges into the second gnolls amid the scattering horses. He blasts a trio of them with his blunderbuss while his lizard lashes out at the fourth one. The gnolls move to surround Harald, but Hedemar spurs his horse into them forcing them back a step and giving Harald time to reload and blast them again with his blunderbuss. 

Meanwhile, Volker circles around behind the first group of gnolls and charges in to aid Doncha, Dolly, and Roderick. One gnoll flees and the others soon fall. 

The second group of gnolls once again surround Harald. His lizard gives as good as it gets, but soon goes down with grievous wounds. The gnolls then fall on Harald. Hedemar kills one with a blow from his mace and Hagle is able to take another down with a stone from his sling. Celestina puts the remaining two to sleep with a spell and the others finish them off.

While administering their last bit of healing to Harald and his mount, the party hears the sounds of more gnolls barking, yipping, and snarling in the distance in nearly every direction. It appears that a large force is sweeping through the forest. The party makes for the dwarven sulfur mine, the closest place of possible refuge.

At the mine, they find Hagle’s tribe of kobolds camped out near the entrance. This is where they fled to when bugbears drove them out of the abandoned goblin caves. The dwarves have permitted them to set up camp but not to enter. When the party informed everyone of the approaching gnoll horde, the dwarves welcome them in and then begrudgingly let the kobolds enter as well as they seal up the entrance to wait things out.

The party is able to rest, tend wounds, and even replace lost armor and reopen ammunition. But the dwarves report from their spy holes that the gnolls appear to be moving southward - in the direction of the Trade Keep!

The Mythic World of Urd: The Owlbear's Den

** The Mythic World of Urd Campaign Page **

The following is from the Arcane Alienist's Dungeon Master session notes for the ongoing campaign in his homebrew setting!  This summary was posted in our private social media.  You can listen to the Alienist himself give an after-action report right here on the Arcane Alienist Podcast!

The party finds itself with three cave entrances to chose form, one that has been fashioned with a crude door.  They choose the closest one (sans door) and discovers the odor of rotting meat emanates from within. Just past the entrance, the cave splits to the left and right.

Hagle the kobold is sent to scout ahead down the right passageway. He finds a chamber with a pool of water in the center. He calls for the others to follow but is immediately attacked by a gray ooze that drops from the ceiling above. Fortunately, it missed and lands on the ground beside him.

Jessup, Celestina, and Dominique scout the other passsge way and encounter a nest of giant rats. The rats are not hostile and one steps forward to sniff the air but does nothing else.

The rest of the party catches up to Hagle in time to help him get away from the ooze, but another emerges from the water and attacks him as well, while a third is spotted on the ceiling above. Roderick hits it with a spear, which lodges in its mass and begins to dissolve. The ooze then drops on to Hedemar.

Harald's Secrets of the Ooze, Lesson #1: Do NOT walk under ooze.  It is just waiting for you...

Hedemar and Hagle are dropped, dying as the oozes dissolved their armor and then their flesh. With a combination of arrows, bombs, and gunfire, the rest of the group are able to kill the oozes and save their fallen allies.

At the sound of gunpowder being set off, the rats scurry back from Jessup and Celestina and into their nest, but a loud roar echoes from further down  the corridor. They head back towards the entrance to rejoin the others as some something large comes barreling towards them. 

As the rejoin the party, an owlbear emerges from the dark of the cave. Jessup hurls a flask of burning oil at it but it’s not enough to stop it and the owlbear falls on him and mortally wounds him. The rest of the party turns to fight the owlbear and after a couple wounds, it flees back where it came from. The clerics are able to heal Jessup’s wounds as the others pursue the owlbear.

Celestina uses her wand of paralyzation to stop the monster, but catches Roderick and Harald in the beam. The others finish off the owlbear and search the rest of the cave while they wait on the magic effects to wear off of their friends.

They recover a valuable owlbear egg, a heap of coins, a magical mace, and a protection scroll from the owlbear’s nest. They also find a jewel encrusted goblet in the shallow pool. Battered and with two party members left without armor, they decide to head back to the trade keep and regroup.