This is part of a series about my DMing Princes of the Apocalypse, a D&D 5e adventure by and copyright Wizards of the Coast.

Table of Contents. The Party.

There will be SPOILERS. If you are playing in a PotA game, please don’t read this. If you are DMing a PotA game, or are a DM who wants to see what the ride was like … read on!

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GM Recap

Session 12 (Day 19-20) 

1. Faith had a dream about the missing Narl Elrok.
2. The party follows the trail of the ambushers of the Mirabar Delegation, an estimated thirty bugbears and humanoids, along a long-desolate roadway in the hills. The roadway ended at a broken bridge over the Dessarin River, but the party tracked the raiders south, camping overnight once they reached the southern edge of the Dessarin Hills. 
3. The next day the trail picked up south, then curving west to the river. They found where the raiders had apparently been picked up in boat(s) — and, by coincidence, a small ship came along, the Rivermaid, commanded by a genasi gentleman, Shoalar Quanderil. He agreed, for a fee, to transport them upriver to where they could get to the Sacred Stone Monastery. He did so, as everyone ducked down as they passed Rivergard Keep. There were no problems, though Shoalar did have some interestingly-labeled shipping crates in the hold.
4. After a treacherous climb from the rubble at river water level to the broken bridge, the party advanced into the hills, following the vague directions given by Thurl Merosska. They walked into a waiting ambush by a party from Rivergard Keep, but managed it handily. Half the assailants fled, but the water priestess Drosnin was gleefully taken out by Faith.
5. As they searched the bodies, William was confronted by a bloody-eyed dwarf, coming up the road in a most threatening fashion.

Player Recap

Faith dreams. You’re soaring above the cloud wrapped snowy peaks, your wings uplifted by great winds, the incipient lightning in the sky tingling along your feathertips. Something catches your eye, of more importance than any rabbit or squirrel or wolf cub might be. You circle, stoop, dive, and You land on a battlefield, the battle long since past, crows cawing at you angrily for your intrusion.

A gaunt figure, vacant-eyed creature cringes before you holding up its arms to ward you off. (Handout: Ghoul) “I surrender!” the ghoul hisses, voice distorted. “I give up. It burns. Stop it from burning. I gave up. I surrendered. I surrendered, I said uncle.”

And it’s not a ghoul, but a young man (Narl Elrok), lying on the snowy ground before you, near death, the blood, too much blood, oozing through the rents in his armor. . On his tabard is the symbol of the Knights of Samular, the crossed sword and torch. He lifts his head, looking at you. “I was sore beset. I cried uncle,” he says, “but they didn’t listen. But he did, he heard, I cried uncle, and he heard. I’m just … so very cold. A fire would be nice. A bright, warm fire, not this cold, dead, tomb, twice dead tomb, not dead tomb. I cried … to the brother … uncle –!”

And the young man’s head lies back down, flops limply to the side in a way that looks very uncomfortable, and your neck hurts, too, and you realize you’ve rolled off of the pillow you formed out of your pack, and it’s morning, and there’s a rock digging into your cheek, and your friends are getting up and fixing breakfast.

William gathers some twigs and bits and bobs then finds a quiet spot to divine the success of our path. A silvery raven pops out of air in front of him and say “Weal of fortune,” Confirming the path forward. As the head out, William easily follows the path of the combatants, occasionally seeing the prints of bugbears mixed in with the humanoids. It dawns on him that this may have once been a road. 

The trail goes south that roughly parallels the Dessarin Road. After a few hours it begins to turn a bit west towards the river. About four hours of travel, the trail suddenly becomes muddled. The path splits into two routes, one going south on a rougher path and the other continuing west along the smoother path. The group continues towards the river. They break through the scrub brush to see a gorge with the remains of an ancient bridge. The slope is steep. There is also a slight signs of a trail going down the cliff on the opposite side. After noting the surroundings, the group backtracks and heads south. After the split, the path turns difficult. 

When the group finally moves out of the difficult terrain, the group spots the river as the sun is setting. Faith notices that the vulture overhead is actually a giant vulture high above them. There may be a rider on the vulture. Moony finds a pleasant campsite and the group rests through the uneventful night. 

Once again William gathers some leaves, pebbles, and seedpods. This time he adds his Raven token then finds a quiet spot to divine the success of their path. A silvery raven pops out of the air in front of him and says “Weal”. They break camp and continue on their way south. Soon the path curves west towards the river. They are now well south of Rivergard. It look like the some boats have were pulled up here. The trail ends at the river. While they try and decide what to do next. Faith notices a large boat heading up the river. The boat is about 30 feet long. Several sailors are working on deck and a halfling is shouting orders. There are fine ornate fish designs on the sails. A nattily dressed blue-green gentleman calls to group. Are you stranded, lost, or in trouble? We are carrying cargo to Yartar. Moony asks if they can take us up river. For the sake of good conversation and company, let’s say 25 gold apiece. Theren persuades him to lower his price to 15. 

He carefully maneuvers the ship closer to the shore and the crew rows over a dingy to pick them up. Once everyone gets aboard, he introduces himself as Shoalar Quanderil, a well-dressed water Genasi armed with a jovial manner, captain of the Rivermaid, along with Pyx his first mate. He asks a few pointed questions, wondering why the group didn’t know that the bridge was out and why we didn’t ask Rivergard for help. Moony derails him with a steady stream of questions about the boat and the river trade. Nala is keeping an eye on the river to spot the Rivergard Keep. She mentions to Shoalar that the group had an encounter with ghouls the night before and asked if they might rest for a bit. He offers the hammocks below deck and Nala and Moony follow Pyx below. Faith curls up in a cloak on deck. Theren stays on deck looking at the horizon. William sits on a crate on the poop deck with his back to the West side of the river. He talks about trade with Shoalar.

As they approach the keep, William notices some palisades on the East bank of the river. When they go by, Shoalar says, “When we pass this bend in the river, the keep will be out of site, if your friends would like to walk the deck more freely.” William, “That obvious is it?” “Well, most folks don’t go below deck unless it’s raining.” Nala notices some crates marked with the Water elemental symbol on her way back up deck. As they approach the broken bridge the group asks Shoalar if there is anything concerning in the area. He mentions the weather, river pirates, and Dwarf pilgrims. They disembark and say farewell.

The path up is steep and challenging. Moony offers to bring a rope to the top to help the others. Part way up he stumbles. William warns the group and then changes into a giant wolf spider. He easily reaches the summit with the rope. When it is secure, Faith and Nala successfully ascend. Theren starts up the rope and slips a bit, recovers himself, and then slips again falling down the slope. After making sure Theren is okay, Moony heads to the top with only a slight bobble. Finally, Theren ties the rope on and the group pulls him up to the top of the trail. 

The party continues ahead to the remains of the bridge. The stones are very worn. Faith notices some design features that look Dwarvish. William studies the path and finds signs of recent travel up the canyon road. A largish group passed by within the last week or so. The path forward looks narrow and smoothed out a bit like the old road on the opposite side. The adventurers make their way up the canyon on high alert. Moony takes the lead stealthily making his way ahead. He spots an old wagon ahead in the middle of the path. When the others approach it is obvious that the cart has been here a very long time. The path splits at this point. 

William hears something off to the right and sees only rock until a figure steps out “Wash this canyon with their blood!” Drosnin is obviously still pissed. The group focuses on Drosnin. Moony plunking her with arrows, William pulling her off the cliff face with a thorn whip, Theren tosses off a fireball that takes the cart, two Reavers, and singes Drosnin. She throws magic missiles at Theren, who deflects them with a shield spell. Faith provokes an attack of opportunity from the Bugbears and races towards Drosnin. She tosses off a lightning bolt and smashes her divine might. That puts an end to Drosnin. Nala, Theren, and Moony take on of the remaining Bugbears and Reavers. At least one enemy flees over the escarpment. William calls forth a Moonbeam to shine radiant light on two of the remaining Bugbears. 

After the last two combatants take off, Faith finds a Black Earth symbol carved into one of the rocks. Moony and William notice some rocks sliding down from the cliff near the body of Drosnin. While several people in the party spot the rocks, no one can find the escaping source of the noise. As they search the area, they find the campsite of Drosnin and the party from Rivergard Keep. There is not much worth looting. There is some camping gear. Drosnin had an obsidian dagger and a knob shaped like a fist. Nala notices that Drosnin and the Reavers have Water element tattoos. The disturbing tattoos on Drosnin appear to be moving. They decide to burn the bodies. 

A Dwarf in tattered black and red livery approaches William, brandishing a branch. “Alright you assassin, let try that again!” 

Game Notes

Dreams

Faith and her dreams are always a good time. In this case I began to weave in elements of the story of Narl Elrok (the missing Knight of Samular) and the fact that his body is in the care of his “uncle,” or, rather, the brother of Samular Caradoon, the founder of his order: Renwick Caradoon, the lich living at Sacred Stone Monastery, where the party was headed.

(I don’t recall now where the flying bird or ghoul imagery came from; the latter might have been a reference to liches and the undead, or just a bit of memory of the previous night’s encounter.)

Somewhere in here I realized I had been throwing a lot of dreams at people, so I created a set of Journal pages in Roll20 to hold the dreams, by episode number, that people had had. I don’t know if it helped the players, but it helped me in later days.

The Wandering Path of the Mirabar Delegation

This is the episode where the zaniness of the missing Mirabar Delegation and their kidnappers’ meandering journey came into actual play. All through the hills they wander, along the bare traces of roadways laid down during the Besilmer Kingdom’s era.

I can’t find much of the preliminary information that might have been in the book but I think I ended writing up an entire several pages about tracking the delegation and their captors, including:

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  A broken dwarvish bridge across the Dessarin River, very difficult to cross from the east (so blocking the Black Earth raiders from getting to the Monastery), but with a rubble-strewn jetty on the west side of the river (for visitors coming up from Rivergard Keep); getting from river level to the path was also non-trivial, involving Athletics challenges.

• A map of the site, complete with bridge, river, jetty, etc. 

I really felt I needed all that in order to understand in my own head how all this worked. 

The party eventually gets to the river. They spot a Feathergale Knight overhead — Thurl is watching for his “agents.”

And finally they get to meet Shoalar Quanderil, the Genasi pirate (Genasi were first developed for this module, though they’ve been modified a bit since). He kept under cover during the initial visit to Rivergard, and the encounter with him in Womford never happened. I figured he would be a perfect tool to get the players upstream toward Sacred Stone Monastery, as well as dropping a few further clues about various goings-on.

The party’s efforts not to be seen by any guards at Rivergard were quite amusing. I considered having Shoalar pull in there, regardless, but decided that created complications I didn’t want the party to have to deal with (a long battle on the ship, for one). And Shoalar — who knew who they were — was happy to simply observe and take notes of where he let them off. Oh, and turn a nice profit off of ferrying them.

Shoalar is also, I decided, the guy who ferried the Black Earth raiders across the river. Which put him in possession of Bruldenthar’s books, some of them at least. That clue comes up in the future.

Also in the cargo hold were some supplies that were, for some reason, branded with the mark of the Crushing Wave cult. But why? It’s not like some supplier is marking the cargo for shipment to Rivergard with that symbol. It wouldn’t make any sense to add the symbol to goods which Shoalar had pirated, either.

(The real reason, of course, is to show Shoalar’s allegiance, or maybe to learn more about the cult and its activities, or stuff like that. Just go along for the pirate ship ride.)

The Revenge of the Rivergard

I decided, leading up to this episode, that if the party wasn’t going to tackle Rivergard, Rivergard would tackle them. In this case, the antagonist was the deeply, deeply offended Water Priestess, Drosnin, whom our cleric Faith had punched in the snoot after being disrespectful. She brought with her half the force at Rivergard and, knowing that the party was after the Sacred Stone Monastery (they’d asked Jolliver about passage there), set up an ambush for our heroes. Who had leveled at least once at that point, so it was clear the ambush was not going to go well.

Since this was all made up, I dug up a generic battle map of a valley with a junction in the middle of it. Perfect. I think this was one of the first maps that I played with Roll20’s dynamic lighting to any degree — and, setting a precedent, spent a lot of time controlling what could or could not be seen behind rocks or ridge lines.

The battle had three results:

First, it left Rivergard seriously weakened for the party’s eventual return. (Or for other events to occur in the meantime.)

Second, a Fathomer named Urshnora — who had been hanging out in Jolliver’s court when the party first visited — was Invisible leading up to the ambush, and, with her awful Initiative throw, seen almost instantly which direction the battle was going before her turn even arrived. So instead of throwing herself into a lost cause, she tip-toed (more or less) away, leaving a pragmatic NPC to encounter another day …

Third, in that very final scene, it gave me a chance to introduce a new Player Character, played by my son who had been off at college prior to that time. Aldrik, one of the dwarvish guards of the Mirabar Delegation, had evidently been taken captive with them, but had broken free from Sacred Stone Monastery, and was in a very befuddled-but-aggressive state.

I think it was originally written up that he was in the tattered rags of his uniform, but if he didn’t get retconned to being nearly naked at that point, then the opportunity came up later on, thus the figurine.

I really didn’t know — yet — why he’d been captured, how he had gotten out, how he’d survived the ordeal, etc., but eventually it would work out beautifully.

Bits and Bobs

William‘s Raven trinket came to play again, using one of the Druid’s new spells, Augury. I’m not a big fan of fortune-telling spells, esp. as what constitutes “weal” and what constitutes “woe” can be somewhat challenging to adjudicate as the DM. But having the raven appear, think it over, and croak one or the other (or both or neither) made it a bit more fun.

William also got to introduce a spell he’d use reliably for the entire campaign, Moonbeam (or, as we tended to nickname it, the “orbital death laser”). Great spell for a nice, steady amount of ongoing damage to the main bad guy.

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