Hello everyone!
This week has been another most excellent one, and a long one to boot!
To the Orb!
Some day I must make my own bit of artwork for this!
Where We’ve Been
This week was the longer of the cycle, with Monster Monday seeing the first combination of two monsters - the Air Elemental Myrmidon and the Warforged Titan, into an absolute terror of a monster, which I’m looking forward to trying out in a oneshot!
Worldbuilding Wednesday and Folklore Friday was all about Elves, with reasonings for why they had not taken over the world by sheer weight of immortal numbers!
It also saw me start my series on building a wargame, which I am looking forward to growing steadily over time! I’ve discussed the general feel of the game, combat mechanics, and turns & pacing thus far, with more to come!
I’ve had a few more questions asked from this note of mine:
and the tab group I’m using to keep them in check is getting quite wide now, so I will likely have another burst of answers coming soon!
Numbers wise, we’re now 50-strong1 and there were over 800 30-day views, so thankyou all for reading - it’s keeping me motivated! Next stop, 1000 30-day views!
Where We’re Going
This week coming is the shorter one - Tuesdays and Thursdays - so we have Training Tuesday, where I go into the semantical rules and physics behind running into things really fast, and Third-Party Thursday, where I had hopes to have the oneshot adventure No Time for the Wicked playtested and reviewed, but sadly I have been embroiled in real-world problems2 and have not managed to get the module run - I’ve looked through it, and it looks amazing, but now I need to run it! Therefore, instead, I have a brutal story and product; the Path of the Ripper Barbarian!
Now, onto the Cheese Chasers!
The Cheese Chase part 6
Last week, the Cheese Chasers made it to the edge of the Hylemoor. They secured their new landship, the Dairylea Dunker, and prepared to proceed across the scoured stone landscape of the moor.
A Wee Injection of Memory
As I have said, the exact details of this campaign, which started over 2 years ago, are a little fuzzy. What I have remembered, since my previous episodes, is that I missed an entire, brilliant, section!
When the party were travelling through the forest, shortly after gaining the Dunker, they opted to stop for the night in the forest to shelter from the rain. The inside of the Dunker was not habitable at this point, with lots of gaps and holes letting in the rain - not to mention the smell of shark! They found a pair of trees growing close together beside the track, and the dense feathery foliage was a natural barrier from the rain3. They joked that they might be legs, and they investigated the area for any monsters, and came up with nothing.
They collected some wood, and they started a fire. I passed a note to Grizz, the barbarian, and he went quiet as we passed notes back and forth for a bit, and Grizz’ player starts quietly rolling some dice. The rest of the party, who were busy tending other aspects of the camp, became curious, so one declared “I will go and se what Grizz is doing”, to which I replied that Grizz had disappeared. The party started looking, and then Zav, the Cleric, took a glancing blow from above (the attack missed), and they realised that something was in the tree.
A brief moment of confusion later, and Charles realises that the tree is the monster, and they start attacking the trunks - which reveal themselves to be the legs of a huge stork, the body of which appears to be a tree. Grizz manages to get a critical hit, and is regurgitated onto the campfire. A brief fight later, and the Tree-Stork starts running from them, and they let it go, reasoning that it was just a hungry ambush predator and that they stumbled into it’s lair.
After this, they elected to chop wood to try and repair the holes i nthe Dunker. Whilst doing so, they are set upon by two Shambling Mounds, which they beat back and slay. Grizz, who has taken it upon himself to become the chef, picks some mushrooms from the back of the mounds and cooks up a stew. Everyone else refuses to try it, except for Jeffery the giant wolf - he and Grizz eat the whole pot.
That night, Miradan is on watch. Grizz wakes up, feeling the pressing knowledge that someone is watching him. Jeffery is growling at one of the barrels, and Grizz approaches - only to see a goblin peeking out of the barrel, and demands that it comes out. Miradan, on watch, hears this and investigates, and sees Grizz making demands of an empty barrel. The goblin (to Grizz) seems to leap out and roll behind a crate; to Miradan, nothing happens. The goblin snatches Grizz’ precious necklace of bear claws and runs off, and Miradan sees nothing. He tries to reassure Grizz that nothing is happening by pulling on the necklace, which is still there, and to Grizz, as soon as he touches it, his top half turns into a goblin, grabs the necklace, and jumps off of Miradan’s still-standing legs and runs behind Jeffery, who has taken it upon himself to turn into a small pink dragon in a straw boater, which is odd considering the weather. Two of the sleeping party members are now looking like a hairy beholder and a blue bottle full of storm clouds, which are rumbling up and down in time with their snoring. Grizz concludes that he is tripping balls because of the mushrooms4, and goes to bed. Miradan then casts sleep on Jeffery, who also drops like a sack of potatoes.
I can’t believe I forgot this whole sequence - but it’s here now, so we can cut back to the rainy edge of the Hylemoor, a day or so later!
Their trek began slowly. The weather beat down, and their steeds managed not so much a trot as a trudge. The stone underfoot is smooth, but not slippy - not even algae can cling to the exposed rock beneath such a torrent of rain.
At some point on this trek, they become aware of some strange anomoly approaching through the weather - a patch of dark cloud, perhaps 10-15ft. across, almost bounding across the landscape. As they slow to get a good look at it, it bounds directly towards them.
Those of you who have been following so far, and have read about multiplying immortal giant cows and magical flying sharks which hunt on the border of planes, will have ascertained that I am partial to homebrewing things5.
What approaches them, which they never discover because they will be fighting for their lives, is a curious elemental creature called a Pressure Weird. It functions similarly to a Water Weird, only it is bound to a storm, not to a pool, and it is generally natural, rather than magically created intentionally.
Pressure Weirds have two very important traits. The first is that they have a low-pressure system around them, which is essentially a vacuum, silencing and suffocating anyone within 10 feet of them. Second is that they have the personalities and playfulness of kittens. They may make a good pet for a warforged, but for people who need to breathe, their playful attention tends to be fatal.
Initiative is rolled, and the Weird leaps forward, crouching down playfully in front of Charles, who immediately becomes aware of the lack of atmosphere around him. The Weird pushes him playfully and wiggles its back, like a playful cat.
Everyone is stumped - they’re used to monsters attacking and it being simple - kill or be killed - but this is different. The strange apparation wants, by the look of it, to play. Charles moves away, and the Weird pulls its party trick - it has a reaction which it can use instead of an opportunity attack - it can pounce, which it does after the other creature finishes its move. Charles gets one breath before he is pursued by the Weird, which is clearly enjoying the game. Marva, the Warlock, is now in the bubble of vacuum and, having ridden the phase-shark in the previous session, knows what she’s feeling. She moves away, but the Weird pounces again - to it, this seems to be a game.
After some breathless attempts to communicate, they have the great idea to use the magical hook they got from the giant fisherman to send it to space. They manage to get the hook lodged in the Weirds mouth, and it disappears. The rope hangs into the air above them, and jerks around. They pull on the rope, to try and bring the hook back, but the Weird comes too, so they yank the rope a third time to send it back, and they leave it there.
After a couple of hours of trudging, they arrived at the edge of a great lake which arced around them. They are briefly puzzled, as they are looking for a cave halfway up the slope of the largest mountain on the South-Eastern edge of the Crescent valley, and they haven’t even found a valley. Then Zav, the Cleric, realises that this lake is the valley - the constant rain, which surrounds the lair of a Blue Dragon, has filled the valley into a lake. With the sky darkening, they make camp between two craggy rocks, to try and keep the worst of the rain off themselves.
During the rest, Miradan is on watch, and becomes suddenly aware of movement behind the camp. He moves warily to investigate, and he sees a bizarre and chilling sight - himself, crouching behind the Hashbow Cart, rooting through the boxes. He calls out a warning to whatever it is, and in a bizarre rippling motion, his doppleganger takes to the sky, undulating upwards into the dark. He can see its progress - whatever this thing is, it has picked out the small glowing trinket that Charles, being an Artificer, had produced at some point along their way. The light disappears into the clouds, and Miradan confusedly wakes everyone to let them know what has just happened. They consider the possibilities - an illusion, or a doppleganger, or some dark ooze creature, or any number of increasingly horrible options.
An hour or so later, they see the light moving outside of the camp. It moves jerkily, and Miradan can pick out that it seems to be being thrown, then suddenly picked up and thrown again. Somewhere in the distance, a bubbling squeaking sound filters through the rain. Charles takes a moment to create another glowing object - a stone - and the other one fades.
The next morning, they continue their trek toward the highest part of the hills which were once mountains above the valley. They become aware of a flapping sound again, and then they notice that there is a second Spitter - the goat which Charles can summon using Find Steed - walking with the group. Charles de-summons Spitter, and there is a sudden oily black smoke-like cloud, and something - definitely not a goat - squeaks away into the clouds. Marva gets a good look at it, and sees that it looks like an Octopus.
The Mimic Bladderpus is a very odd creature. It is approximately the size of a man, and yet it weighs next to nothing. The majority of the bulk of this invertibrate is made up of the series of gas bladders which run through its body and tentacles. These it fills with a strange gas, lighter than air, which it uses to lift it off of the ground. It also uses these bladders, along with it’s chameleonic skin, to twist itsef around and allow it to imitate the form of virtually anything it can see.
Bladderpuses will attack if they feel threatened, but are generally inquisitive creatures, apt to perform pranks and practical jokes, misleading their pursuers by floating effortlessly over hazardous ground, tricking them into following them and getting mired, or even drowned.
Bladderpuses are generally attracted to shiny things, and often accost those wearing shiny armour, or wielding shiny weapons - attention which is often resented by the Druids of a party, who would usually love to interact with an inquisitive and playful flying giant octopus, but get rejected in favour of their shinier, less interested associates.
Through a series of animal handling checks, Marva managed to attract the attention of this strange, floating cephalapod, and when she offered it something6 to play with, it became her friend. She named it Squishy, and it trailed after the party for the rest of the session, playing with the thing, and making happy, bubbly squeaks. Occasionally, it played catch with Marva, and it took a special interest in Zav, who was wearing polished plate armour. Zav was not best pleased by this attention.
At length, the party arrived at the highest peak about the lake, and looked over the hillside, seeing no indication of a cave. This was when, after some discussion, one of them suggested that it was under the water.
A brief investigation later proved that, around 100ft. down, there was indeed an entrance to a cave. They parked their wagon in as sheltered a spot as they could find, tell the mounts to wait for them, and they dive in. They have a brief swim down7, they find themselves entering a U-bend in the cave, and emerge in a subterranean lake. Charles, being the only character without darkvision, is basically blind, but everyone else merrily swims to the edge and climbs out. 5 Prestidigitations later, and they’re all dry too. They stand at the precipice of a wide cave, sloping downwards, toward the lair of a dragon that they all hope, and pray, is sleeping.
And that’s where I’ll leave it for this week!
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Until next time, happy Slaying!
Some might say that 50 isn’t a lot of followers, but if we were all in a game of D&D together, the combat would take forever!
motorcycle related breakdowns, both physical and mental, and the logistics of changing jobs, and running my regular campaign, and working 12hr shifts, and so forth have all compiled to leave me a shattered and broken wreck upon the harsh cliffs of reality.
Avid readers may anticipate what is to come!
It felt a bit like metagaming, but I guess the player wasn’t up for the roleplay!
This is, potentially, why you are here after all!
My brains have been raked, wrung, and shaken, and yet I cannot remember exactly what the thing was. It was shiny, and the octopus loved it, but I cannot recall it! Rather than do you the disservice of pretending, I prefer to come clean. So be aware that it was a thing, and it was shiny. A shiny thing, if you will.
The rules for holding your breath in D&D are, frankly, absurd. I appreciate that they’re streamlined, but with a constitution modifier of +2, you can hold your breath for 2 minutes, whilst swimming as fast as possible. That’s 1,200ft. of swimming underwater, assuming a 30ft. speed and dashing. The world record in reality is 185ft. The barbarian, with a speed of 40ft. and +4 con, could do 3200ft, which is over half a mile.