Shadowdark Thracia 3
Players: Zema Zafat Fenn/Bomb Akakius Akashic Ildelfen
Recap:
Session began with the introduction of Ildelfen to the party.
Party explored more of the overland above the dungeon, seeking to investigate the mapped structures to the north. When they reached Area C they discovered the Dwarven Tablet which told them of the Secret Cult Entrance (Area B) which they had already discovered. Still it was a secret so worth an XP reward.
Fenn and Akashic then went to investigate Area D which was a ruin that went into the pond. Fenn noticed the reeds turning to point towards him as he approached, so he decided to wave. They quickly learned that this was an ambush set up as bone darts flew out of the reeds in the pond and hit them. Fenn was most hurt from the attack.
Both Akakius and Ildelfen tried to cast cure wounds on Fenn but with no luck. In fact Akakius had a critical failure, which upset his God Ord, who demanded that 5gp worth of Akakius’ treasure be cast into the water.
After this meager loss of funds the party moved south back to Area A where they saw that it was actually empty of any patrols. Seizing the opportunity they made their way into the Caverns.
Inside the caverns, Zema quickly gathered up some guano in a flask for his downtime experiments. Ildelfen and Akashic learned that the Western hallway in room 1-1 lead to a dead end. Zema and Akakius investigated the Bat Alcove (1-3) and discovered that the ruined statue was a depiction of Athena.
With Fenn scouting ahead, the party made their way through the Eastern hallway out of 1-1 and approached area 1-9a. Cautiously, Ildelfen declared he would like to check the hallway for traps. With a successful investigation he discovered the painted over door. The party removed the chipped paint to reveal the inscription on the door. The inscription read that through the doors was the realm of Death and that there would be no return.
Not ready yet to enter, the party decided to further investigate the hallway. Fenn noticed the hallway 1-6 was rigged with a spear trap, however his efforts to disarm it failed and he was impaled. The sprung trap awoke a sleeping Gnoll guard who didn’t seem too bothered. The party instead used his ambivalence as an opportunity to aid Fenn, yet none were successful in stabilizing him. Fenn died in the embrace of Thanatos.
Bomb, the halfling, woke up tied and hanging over a mild fire in room 1-8, the Gnoll outpost, surrounded by 6 of them. Luckily her binds were shoddy and she was able to escape, but she lead all the Gnolls out into the hallway where they spotted the party. Bomb turned invisible and ran to the party who were surrounding Fenn’s corpse.
Thinking quickly, Zema cast sleep on the Gnolls and the rest of the party subsequently slaughtered them and looted their bodies (8sp among the 7 Gnolls). Inside the outpost they found three identical warhammers, each worth 10gp.
The party then returned to the door and opened it to see it led to a narrow hallway of pitch black. No source of light could illuminate beyond 5ft within this darkness. Zema cast detect magic 3 times successfully and determined the nature of this hallway: it is shrouded in darkness from the realm of death and is rigged with teleportation magic. Indeed, as the engraving warned, no one who enters through this door may return this way.
With that knowledge gleaned, the party returned to Minos, having lost a friend but gained a new one.
Downtime: Zema and Bomb tested out making explosive saltpeter from the collected guano but were unsuccessful.
For next session:
Lizardmen in room 1-5 left their dead friend behind.
Gnolls too afraid to enter the dark hallway. They sent one Beta who never came back (his body can be found near the Wight in room 1-9.
The cult has not discovered the open hallway yet.
Gnolls in Area A still raid Area B.
Thoughts:
At least this session did not result in a combat slog. Not as much dungeoneering as I had hoped but I think that has more to do with the party choosing to investigate the overworld. Unfortunately there just isn’t much going on up there. Next time should hopefully have a renewed emphasis on getting into the dungeon as fast as possible.
With the major discovery of the hallway I am curious to see how the party handles it. I have a feeling they may avoid entry, knowing that they can’t make it out this way. I have an escape the dungeon table but it will only work if they have mapped a way out. In the realm of death, there is no such escape. This certainly has me a bit worried for when they do decide to explore.
When it comes to player death, I don’t like how everyone gets to try and stabilize a dying character. In combat this won’t come up often since there are other priorities, but as was the case this session, if a character falls to a trap, it will resort to everyone having a go at saving them. It basically makes dying to a trap impossible.
The realm of death does not have this issue. Anyone who hits 0 hp instantly dies there.
However, I am toying with the idea of a massive damage rule. Should a character receive damage that is double the value of their current hp they are insta-gibbed. No bleeding out.
Note: Massive damage feels shitty in an already lethal game. Better to introduce Enduring Wounds for those getting up from 0HP.
More broadly I am not sure if the players are cool with how lazy I am when it comes to broader lore. In my view, Thracia has enough dungeon specific lore that comes into play that I don’t really feel like expanding on. We are basically playing in some fantasy version Iron Age earth. The Bronze Age collapse happened a few hundred years ago, but many of the old nations still exist as remnants of their former glory. At the same time I wanted to keep the Shadowdark core stuff in. So the Shadowdark dieties are still worshipped. I haven’t come up with a legitimate reason why.
I am happy for players to bring their own interpretations of the broader world. We aren’t really exploring anything outside of Thracia. If I were to plug in other modules they would also need to keep to the Bronze Age theme or be vague enough to work with this setting.