A fun, light game

[Koumei]

So I'm running a little D&D game on IRC. Varying levels of optimisation skill, but everyone making characters they're happy with, and we're mostly playing it by ear. It started at level 4 and is now level 5. We have:

A half-fey Minotaur. Using the Schutzaffel Savage Species progression, but any time it says to take an LA level, he just skips that and takes a HD level as well. Because like fuck is a 6HD CR 4 monster a level 8 character.

A half-shadow human rogue. She's good - in anything less than full daylight she gets 9/10 concealment and the 20% miss chance, so Sneak Attack is always on. Will be using a DM Fiat power to skin enemies to make into appropriate magic items.

A kobold (no light blindness) Warlock. Occasionally, on shitty levels, I just flat-out grant another minor power.

2 other potential players, one thinking of being a Skeleton Dread Necromancer, the other a Tiefling (no LA) something.

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So I ran an intro session for kobold and rogue, to get them on the same page. The rogue was guarding a caravan that was carrying vital cargo that would ensure peace in Toddmidon, which is almost in riot conditions. The kobold is in a small town on the way, and overhears some men talking about setting up an avalanche to rob the caravan. So he follows them.

Well, the thugs discover that some evil dastardly elfs are waiting in ambush, so they decide to light the explosives early, hating elfs enough to ruin their ambush. This results in a blocked passage, with injured elfs, and the thugs. Caught between the PCs. The cart driver takes a near-lethal wound, but the rogue is efficient at killing people with sneak attack, and the kobold creates mist and zaps elfs as well. They then loot the bodies and revive the driver, who has the town reward them with gold and help them on their way to the big city: the kobold wanted books for information (and Toddmidon is the sort of North-UK place where they pronounce books as rhyming with spooks) and the rogue, being a 19 year old girl, wants to buy a pet horse and a panther and...

So the first actual session sees the minotaur join them - they all head to the library for books on the way to checking out a mission so important that a town crier is making it known. See, most of the elder races are basically wiped out, having been overrun by the young races (humans, goblins and the like). So almost everything has been rapidly recolonised by humans, except for the underworld: they know that the underground is almost entirely a series of tunnels inhabited by "bad stuff", with pillars keeping the surface intact.

So Lord Notanork Grey, living in Castle Dorfenstein, has threatened to collapse the towers, destroying the city, unless paid 36 trilliard gold pieces. The king has offered a large mansion (shared) and 400 pounds of gold (each) to whoever can save the town.

So they head on out. On the way, they see some dorfs "hiding" (I rolled a 2) in ambush, so they shout out at them. The dorfs, having lost the element of surprise, run away. The team then go through an underground cavern where they crush a boulder and then kill some dire weasels, before discovering the dire weasels had a pup. So they adopt it.

They then get into the castle itself, where they get attacked by a door. A doorforged, if you will. They end up hypnotising it (it's not an object or construct) to let them through, and they loot the room. In another room, they discover... a rubber ball. Then they enter a room to find a lady in an expensive gown sipping tea and eating cake. Also, she has a spider head.

They try conversation, and she tries to throw a web at them but loses Initiative (no surprise round, the players mostly wanted to attack anyway, and who trusts a spider-head?). She gets spear-tackled into the wall for a OHKO by the minotaur. They then find a wand, and blow a charge discovering it's a wand of summon swarm.

Also they discover cake, and the kobold uses magi-vision to discover it has a Minor Transmutation. So he says "No magic, looks safe to me." - thinking it gives you a spider head. The lady was just an aranea.

But they leave the cake alone. It was actually a Cake of Deliciousness: tastes good, always.

Then they go upstairs and discover Lord Notanork (who they assume is an ork trying to be cunning) is not in his war room. The desk has maps and is filled with magic auras, there is a cloak draped over his chair, and his boots are lying on the floor...

Yes, the cloaker attacks them when they investigate. It gets a good start, but quickly loses its advantage when the kobold and rogue recover from being nauseated. So he surrenders and they let him live as a butler for their mansion - he can call the treasure his, it's all he wanted all along.

(Yes, he made the ridiculous demands under the belief that such an amount could be paid. Also, he named himself Notanork precisely so people would think he was.)

They then went to the roof to meet his boss, "a mighty red dragon"... who is the size of a cat. It's a pseudodragon who was trying to basically lure him into doing something dumb and not causing any trouble, while the real evil is underground. He then admits to the party he's too weak to do anything, and pleads with them to stop the evil forces for him. They let him live in their mansion as well.

So next session, they get to go underground.

[Koumei]

So now they're designing the mansion and having a ball doing so. They also want to hire/bind some elementals for heating, make a giant labyrinth, have magical lights, and eventually rob a bank to get the funding for all the above.

It's really going well so far, and the players are genuinely excited about what started out as a "Why not?" dungeoncrawl.

[Koumei]

So, the same trio again, but this time with an NPC Druid they requested. They decided to go underground to leave their mark, and to rescue some slaves. So first thing first, they find some Ankhegs and an encounter develops. If it weren't for the rogue never being flat-footed and always getting Sneak Attack, the Warlock would have received a OHKO from one of them. But she really kills stuff with 1 hit - weapon + Sneak Attack + 2d12 Poison.

So they killed the Ankhegs and harvested their shells, before meeting a Black Wyrmling. I have an idea for how this team works and what they like, so I had it approach wanting to play. They befriended it, and it helped guide them to some dwarfs to kill. Dwarfs in my setting speak a mixture of every European language, along with Pikey (see: Snatch). They got some info on the slavers. After that they wandered along a bit more, avoided an Earth Mephit that was working on a device, and then had a conversation with a Barghest.

It didn't speak Common. So the Warlock had Infernal chosen as one of his bonus languages by me, and worked as a translator. Infernal sounds like ...Strobi? from "A Bit of Fry & Laurie". Including a normal word actually being an insult in Infernal. So they fought, and it died gloriously. They looted the boxes it was guarding, getting a few hundred pounds of gold and a crate full of cocaine. Er, I mean, one of the powdered drugs from Book of Vile Body Piercings.

A bit more wandering led them to a goblin merchant who they robbed blind, but then paid with a bag of coke, more than covering the tanglefoot bag feather tokens and wands. They now have Web + Summon Swarm in wand form, but haven't thought to use them together to win the game.

They then met some more goblins and gave them hope - also getting more info on the slavers They're Cephalyx by the way, from Iron Kingdoms.

So they continued on to the Cephalyx base, where they used Warlock fog to sneak up to the door. This caused the hobgoblin guards to talk about how odd it was and "What if it's a vampire? They scare me!" So Summon Swarm was used to terrify them, and in the confusion, the party inside the mist went through the door.

They found a torture room, traversed a scorpion pit (mandatory due to dungeon regulations), and found a room with a stone tub with a magic ring, a shark, and heaps of water. It was labelled "Lucky Dip!"

After zapping the shark, they showed cleverness by testing for acid. Yes, it was an acid pool, so diving in would be a death trap. So the minotaur grabs it and gets some healing. You all know what the ring is: ring of acid resistance (30).

Then, to remind them they have a black (acid immune) dragon hanging around, I have it decide it's thirsty and drink some of the acid.

More wandering, they fight an escaped slave who is just too angry: a Satyxis Ninja who they kill in one go (rogue, again). So they steal her +1 Frost Katana MASTERWORK BASTARD SWORD and move on, eventually fighting a Purple Dragon.

It's Very Young, and Large, and holy shit it did a number on them. I actually halved it's breath weapon damage (then proceeded to roll a 4) because it's a bit crazy, but it reduced the minotaur to 3 HP with one bite. The next turn, luckily, they all gang-bashed it and it died.

So I decided "Fuck WBL, they already have about a million in coke, this dragon slept on a 15x15x3 foot bed of gold!"

Now, a rough calculation tells me this: 15*15*3 = 450 cubic feet.
It's approx. 2*3*6 = 36 gold bars to the cubic foot. So we have 450*36 = 16,200 bricks, multiplied by the weight of them (about 30 pounds each), then multiplied by 25 (25 GP to the pound)... the total is 18,832,500 gold pieces. 18.8 million fucking pieces.

Now, if I made a mistake there somewhere, someone please correct me. But I'm not going to do a dick move and take it back: it will take 30 trips for them to carry it all back, so they can just make the 30 trips, have ~20 million (after selling the drugs) and then buy a huge castle and play the game of spending money on crazy decorations and things.

[Koumei]

I ran again on Christmas eve but basically it was just finishing the quest off:

They wandered a bit, and rescued some victims of the slavers, who had mind-control helmets bolted onto their heads. They then went and met the Cephalyx, who turned out to be stupidly disappointing enemies. Really. They're meant to be Illithid-level creepy controllers, except more creepy because they're basically human. One round and they were down.

After that they just moved on a bit, discovered the place had a crazy layout, killed an Aranea Sorcerer and moved on, seeing light. Yeah, it wasn't that exciting. Once they hit level 8 I might use Genestealers, or Mind Flayers, or something, to set up a spooky foe.

[Koumei]

So, now they're basically in the Wish economy - they've covered themselves in <15K gear, although the Warlock couldn't really find much that interested him. Also the dire weasel they rescued earlier has now grown and be trained to a degree.

So I have been noticing that they kill everything in the first round. I decided to make them fight Pokemon to see how it'd go. Ice and Ghost themed - a frozen palace had just appeared in the North.

"Now I know you're used to the alligators and tropical storms here (note: the game is basically set in England), but I need you to go somewhere cold."

When they met the people in the town where the palace had appeared, they were surprised by the appearance of the 1/2 fey minotaur.

"1d20-1 Knowledge: what the fuck"
"Knowledge: what the fuck: 0 [1d20: 1]"

"Oo-ar, oo-ar, that thar be a drow."

So some Drifloons try to abduct the kobold and get killed. They smash the front door in, and discover everything in the place is made of ice. Two can fly, the other one can auto-Balance. They then encounter some Snorunts who just panic and act defensive, so they leave them alone. Next they discover some books, and get ambushed and attacked by a pair of Shuppets. The kobold is nearly knocked out because he has what, 20 HP at level 6?

But they quickly kill and skin the Shuppets and move on. They then find a trap of curing, heal up and rescue a Rotom, before getting attacked by 2 Sneasels. I realised the Punishment ability would just one-shot the party, so toned it down to "+2d6 damage if you have any magic on". Still, the minotaur and rogue were significally harmed before wild Sneasels fainted.

Finally they get into a fight with Froslass, leader of the pokemon, and the kobold drops to -1 HP. I quickly realise their glass-cannon set-up would result in a TPK if I used any other SLAs, so just had it slam ineffectually and they eventually took it out. It lasted several rounds due to 50% miss chance (even with Ghost Touch: Snow Cloak was in effect) and Mirror Image, but the first time they hit, it's a critical with the minotaur's axe. BAM. Dead.

I'm so sick of the kobold not having hit points that I just put a crest of +6 Con in the loot, but he decides "It takes up the head slot, I like my Stylish Hat of Prestidigitation too much." and gives it to the minotaur. I'm tempted to just adopt an attitude of "Fine. it's not my fucking fault if you die."

Also they found a dragon egg. Eventually it'll hatch and they'll have a "dragon" (1/2 dragon HugeThing (TM)) to ride around. And they trained the weasel into a warbeast (MooMooTwo) and gave it equipment. It is now a total monster, but still utterly cute.

[Koumei]

Incidentally, could anyone here suggest some good foes for "lasting more than one round, maybe even hurting them a bit but not just killing them"?

I'm tempted to throw a Shivering-Touch-Breather at them, so they all take Dex damage then pound on the foe a bit (as it'll basically have no other tricks), then they spend the rest of the adventure at a weakened capacity (acting later thus even weak enemies get to do something).

[CatharzGodfoot]

Shivering touch can easily incapacitate, and makes the affected easier to hit. In other words, it will probably just result in a TPK. A ghost that can hit them with aging penalties but doesn't have any of the more powerful offensive capabilities might do what you want. Just make sure that you give them a way to feel young again.

[Judging__Eagle]

Necromentals from LM have con damage, use it against the minotaur. I use them against RoW barbarian characters to make them feel weaker after a fight.

[Maxus]

I'd make some semi-sentient monster and give it something a buddy worked out.

It has some ioun-stone-like things orbiting it at a fixed radius, basically set into an impenetrable shield. The shield nulls all attacks, so they have to do called shots to break the stones to drop the shield.